The federal government will shut down Friday should Congress fail to pass some sort of funding mechanism, be it a short-term measure to avoid a shutdown or budget bills for the remaining fiscal year set to end in September.

And as lawmakers break out their paring knives to compromise on spending cuts and abate a $1.4 trillion budget shortfall, some things important to the university and its students, such as financial aid and research dollars, could end up being left out.

The Associated Press last week published a story that pegged FRIB as a possibly at-risk project in terms of continued funding. The possibility was taken from statements by Energy Secretary Steven Chu that $1.1 billion could be cut from science spending under an aging proposal passed months ago by the House.

The $500 million-plus facility, which is being built at MSU and is expected to be operational by 2020, was appropriated $10 million in President Barack Obama’s budget request for this year.

Officials at FRIB could not be reached for comment about the fate of funding for the project, but Mark Burnham, MSU’s vice president for governmental affairs, said the project might have dodged the bullet.

“It appears that the key science accounts that we rely on are probably going to be OK,” Burnham said.

But because Congress has yet to act on this year’s budget, the university has been “reading tea leaves” to best predict where cuts might come from and areas that might survive without, Burnham said.

That practice will have to continue as lawmakers work to hammer out compromises on key spending issues, as the Republican House’s original spending cuts bill from months ago has yet to be approved by the Democratic Senate. The original proposal, reports say, likely will not survive intact.

Congressional support for FRIB during these budget talks has come from a source who said the project will create jobs and contribute to economic growth in the region during construction and once it is operational.

U.S. Rep. Mike Rogers, R-Brighton, has been a staunch and vocal supporter of the nearly $61 billion in cuts proposed by the U.S. House’s Republican leadership. Rogers consistently has told The State News in the months since Congress began the new term in January that all aspects of the federal budget — student financial aid and research spending included — must be examined as potential cuts.

But FRIB, he said, stands out.

“The funding has been committed and the Department of Energy has made the project a priority,” Rogers said in an email. “There are countless other areas to cut waste from the federal budget.”