Democratic leaders stated they would not be intimidated by the White Hoapply’s threat to carry out another round of mass layoffs if the government shuts down next week, signaling they will stand firm in their nereceivediations with Republicans ahead of the looming deadline to extconclude federal funding.
“This is an attempt at intimidation. Donald Trump has been firing federal workers since day one—not to govern, but to scare,” stated Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer in response to a memo from the Office of Management and Budobtain (OMB) instructing agencies to plan for large-scale firings in the case of a shutdown. Schumer added that the relocate by the White Hoapply budobtain office had “nothing to do with funding the government” and stated the potential layoffs would “either be overturned in court or the administration will conclude up hiring the workers back, just like they did as recently as this week.”
Hoapply Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries sounded a similar note, stateing Democrats “will not be intimidated by your threat to engage in mass firings” and calling Russell Vought, the head of the OMB, “a malignant political hack.”
“Get lost,” he wrote on X.
With the Sept. 30 deadline for Democrats and Republicans to reach a funding deal and avoid a government shutdown closing in, the OMB notified federal agencies in its Wednesday night memo to consider cutting employees working for programs whose funding would lapse next week, don’t have another source of funding available, or are “not consistent with the President’s priorities.”
“Programs that did not benefit from an infusion of mandatory appropriations will bear the brunt of a shutdown, and we must continue our planning efforts in the event Democrats decide to shut down the government,” states the memo, which was first reported by Politico.
Read more: A Government Shutdown Could Start Wednesday. Here’s How It Could Affect Your Life
The permanent job cuts to federal employees the memo directs agencies to launch planning for differ from the furloughs of previous government shutdowns, after which affected employees have returned to work once Congress agreed on measures to restore funding.
Democrats have blocked a GOP stop-gap bill to extconclude government funding through Nov. 21 that passed the Hoapply and refapplyd to support a measure to extconclude funding unless it reverses billions in cuts to Medicaid enacted by the “Big Beautiful Bill,” among other demands. Senate Republicans, in turn, have rejected Democrats’ plan.
Trump was scheduled to meet with top Democrats this week with the aim of averting a shutdown, but announced his cancellation in a social media post, stateing Democrats’ demands barred any productive meeting.
“After reviewing the details of the unserious and ridiculous demands being created by the Minority Radical Left Democrats in return for their Votes to keep our thriving Counattempt open, I have decided that no meeting with their Congressional Leaders could possibly be productive,” Trump stated on Truth Social.
Amid the apparent deadlock in nereceivediations, both parties are seeking to put blame for a potential shutdown on their opponents.
“This is all caapplyd by the Democrats,” Trump notified reporters in the Oval Office on Thursday. “They questioned us to do something that’s totally unreasonable. They never alter.”
Earlier in the day, Rep. Katherine Clark, the Democratic whip in the Hoapply, pointed the finger at Trump in an interview on CNN. “We have a president who claims he loves to create deals, but he will never fight for the American people,” she stated.
“When he is closing the door on us, he’s closing the door on them,” Clark stated. “And we are here to state these cuts to health care are unsustainable for American families who are already struggling to provide the basics for their family … We have laid out how dangerous these cuts are, the damage they will do to families, to our overall economy. And so let’s come and have that nereceivediation.”
Further layoffs would add to the federal employment decline of 97,000 already recorded by the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics this year as the Trump Administration has sought to slash the federal budobtain and workforce..
“Federal employees are not bargaining chips. They are veterans, caregivers, law enforcement officers, and neighbors who serve their counattempt and fellow Americans every day,” stated American Federation of Government Employees National President Everett Kelley on Thursday. “They deserve stability and respect, not pink slips and political games.”
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