White House warns layoffs are imminent if shutdown drags on
Leavitt tells reporters that government agencies are already preparing for cuts and “layoffs are imminent”.
“Unfortunately, because the Democrats shut down the government, the president has directed his cabinet and the Office of Management and Budget is working with agencies across the board to identify where cuts can be made and we believe that layoffs are imminent,” she says.
Key events
With the Senate set to leave this afternoon and still be gone tomorrow to observe Yom Kippur, the government shutdown will last until at least Friday (though likely longer, as a funding compromise hasn’t yet materialised). The House, meanwhile, won’t return until next week.
After weeks of threats from both sides and negotiations that went nowhere, the US is once again experiencing a government shutdown. For this week’s edition of our excellent Politics Weekly America podcast, Jonathan Freedland speaks to Marianna Sotomayor, a congressional reporter at the Washington Post, to look at who should take the blame, who suffers, and who will blink first.
You can listen to the episode here:
On that topic of the conversation Republicans and Democrats were seen having on the Senate floor earlier this afternoon, Richard Blumenthal of Connecticut has told NBC News that “there is a lot of bipartisan hope that we can make this shutdown as short and costless as possible.
Peter Welch of Vermont added that Chuck Schumer is “very supportive of members having conversations with colleagues”. “This is a point where rank-and-file members should be talking,” Welch said.
New Mexico’s Ben Ray Luján also told NBC that as long as members are talking, “there’s always a chance for a solution”.
“I’ve seen moments where people thought that there was an impasse on whatever the policy was and snap the fingers, there’s a solution, there’s a resolution,” Luján said. “People work together and get it done.”
Group of bipartisan senators seeking way out of shutdown
Chris Stein
As the Senate this afternoon voted on the Republican proposal to restart government funding, a bipartisan knot of lawmakers could be seen discussing something on the chamber floor.
It was a good indication that lawmakers were looking for a way out of the funding lapse, which carries risks for both parties, not to mention Americans writ large.
Shortly after the votes concluded, South Dakota Republican Mike Rounds, who was spotted among the group, indicated that a short-term funding bill, known as a continuing resolution (CR), may be under discussion.
Democrats “want to address a number of issues in a CR, all of which can be done during the regular appropriations process, which a 45-day CR would give us time to complete,” Rounds wrote on X, and referred to the minority’s demand to continue enhanced tax credits for Affordable Care Act health plan premiums.
“Republicans will work with Democrats on this issue, but not until we get government reopened again,” he said.
Only time will tell if this is an actual concrete sign of a deal being reached to reopen the government. Party leaders have not changed their demands since the shutdown began at 12.01am ET.
David Smith
Speaking to reporters at the briefing earlier, JD Vance engaged in whataboutism, claiming that it is Democrats who are lying.
“If you look at the legislative text that [Democrats] gave us, they tried to turn on two separate provisions that would give healthcare benefits to illegal aliens,” he said. “It’s a lie told by the Democrats that they’re not trying to give healthcare benefits to illegal aliens.”
The vice-president also continued his attack on Chuck Schumer, suggesting this all comes down to politics in New York state. “The reality here, and let’s be honest about the politics, is that Chuck Schumer is terrified he’s going to get a primary challenge from Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez,” he said.
He went on: “The reason why the American people’s government is shutdown is because Chuck Schumer is listening to the far left radicals in his own party because he’s terrified of a primary challenge.
“So I’d invite Chuck Schumer to join the moderate Democrats and 52 Senate Republicans and do the right thing, open up the people’s government and then let’s fix healthcare policy for the American people.”
Vance then took questions from reporters and claimed “it’s obviously a Democratic shutdown”, not a Republican one.
Peter Doocy of Fox News noted that Republicans are claiming Democrats want to fund healthcare for illegal immigrants, and Democrats say this is a lie, which portends a long shutdown.
The vice-president replied: “I can’t predict what congressional Democrats are going to do, Peter, but I actually don’t think it’s going to be that long of a shutdown. This is just the guess of the vice-president of the United States because I think you already saw some evidence that moderate Democrats are cracking. They understand the fundamental illogic.”
Trump administration scraps $8bn for climate-related projects in 16 blue states
Despite JD Vance and Karoline Leavitt being sparse on details about what is going to be cut amid the government shutdown, White House budget director Russell Vought has just announced another one.
The Trump administration is cancelling nearly $8bn in climate-related funding targeting projects in 16 US states, including California and New York, Vought said on X.
Calling the money “Green New Scam funding to fuel the Left’s climate agenda”, he lists the affected states: “CA, CO, CT, DE, HI, IL, MD, MA, MN, NH, NJ, NM, NY, OR, VT, WA”
Details of the cancellations will come from the US energy department, Vought added.
White House warns layoffs are imminent if shutdown drags on
Leavitt tells reporters that government agencies are already preparing for cuts and “layoffs are imminent”.
“Unfortunately, because the Democrats shut down the government, the president has directed his cabinet and the Office of Management and Budget is working with agencies across the board to identify where cuts can be made and we believe that layoffs are imminent,” she says.
Leavitt says the Trump administration will soon announce another nominee to lead the Bureau of Labor Statistics, a day after withdrawing the nomination of conservative economist EJ Antoni.
“EJ Antoni remains a great ally of the president and our team. It became clear, unfortunately, that he was not going to have the votes, and so we will be announcing a replacement nominee very soon,” she says.
Leavitt says there are “sensitive discussions” taking place over Donald Trump’s proposal to end the war in Gaza but doesn’t comment further.
The president gave Hamas “three or four days” to accept the proposal, otherwise he would fully back Israel to “finish the job” in Gaza.
CNN is now also reporting that White House budget chief Russell Vought warned a group of House Republicans that some permanent layoffs of federal workers would take effect in “one to two” days, citing four people on the call.
CNN reports that Vought didn’t offer clarity on which federal workers could see layoffs or how many people could be affected, but signaled that the administration would start with agencies that fall outside their priorities, the people said.
The New York Times has heard similar.
As we’ve been reporting this comes in the context of Vought and others in the Trump administration warning that they would use their powers during a shutdown to further shrink the size of the federal government to reflect the White House’s agenda.
Vought also warned that a popular federal safety net program for mothers and young children – called WIC – will run out of money by next week, according to CNN’s sources.
Leavitt takes over again.
She says there are unfortunate consequences to a shutdown and decisions about what needs to come to an end are being made and layoffs are going to be part of that.
Asked about Jeffries saying the meme Trump posted of him was racist, Vance says: “I don’t even know what that means”.
He goes on to say he’s sure people know the moustache and hair were not real. Which … wasn’t the point being made.
