'An IOU doesn't pay my mortgage.' Bremerton suffers as shipworkers go unpaid

'An IOU doesn't pay my mortgage.' Bremerton suffers as shipworkers go unpaid Scott Greenstone November 11, 2025 / 5:50 pm

Outside the gates of the Puget Sound Naval Shipyard in Bremerton, workers are heading straight home. Along the street to the ferry, coffee shops are closing up early, and bars are expecting fewer Monday Night Football watchers than normal.

“Across the board, everybody’s feeling it,” said Saleem Patterson, tending an empty bar at the Town Portal arcade across from the shipyard. “Because this is a Navy town, and of course it’s going to be the first place to get hit, right? Like, if you can’t afford to go out and play, you’re not going to go out and play.”

The longest federal government shutdown in history has hit Bremerton like a broadside. One out of every thre