That includes roughly 63,000 of the 68,000 people employed by U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP), the agency that inspects cargo going through the Port of Houston and Texas' 31 other official ports of entry. Emmett noted that customs brokers were already reporting processing delays even before the government shutdown began at midnight Eastern Time. "Well, if you have a shutdown, and if that gets worse, then obviously that will delay a lot of traffic coming through the port." According to an analysis by the Texas Ports Association, Texas ports support roughly 2.5 million jobs statewide. [The] estimated first-quarter gross domestic product was reduced by about $8 billion.”Copyright 2025 Houston Public Media News 88.7