Trump Uses Shutdown to Dole Out Firings10/02 06:21

   President Donald Trump has seized on the government shutdown as an 
opportunity to reshape the federal workforce and punish detractors, by 
threatening mass firings of workers and suggesting "irreversible" cuts to 
programs important to Democrats.

   WASHINGTON (AP) -- President Donald Trump has seized on the government 
shutdown as an opportunity to reshape the federal workforce and punish 
detractors, by threatening mass firings of workers and suggesting 
"irreversible" cuts to programs important to Democrats.

   Rather than simply furlough employees, as is usually done during any lapse 
of funds, White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt said layoffs were 
"imminent." The Office of Management and Budget announced it was putting on 
hold roughly $18 billion of infrastructure funds for New York's subway and 
Hudson Tunnel projects -- in the hometown of the Democratic leaders of the U.S. 
House and Senate.

   Trump has marveled over the handiwork of his budget director.

   "He can trim the budget to a level that you couldn't do any other way," the 
president said at the start of the week of OMB Director Russ Vought, who was 
also a chief architect of the Project 2025 conservative policy book.

   "So they're taking a risk by having a shutdown," Trump said during an event 
at the White House.

   Thursday is day two of the shutdown, and already the dial is turned high. 
The aggressive approach coming from the Trump administration is what certain 
lawmakers and budget observers feared if Congress, which has the responsibility 
to pass legislation to fund government, failed to do its work and relinquished 
control to the White House.

   Vought, in a private conference call with House GOP lawmakers Wednesday 
afternoon, told them of layoffs starting in the next day or two. It's an 
extension of the Department of Government Efficiency work under Elon Musk that 
slashed through the federal government at the start of the year.

   "These are all things that the Trump administration has been doing since 
January 20th," said House Democratic leader Hakeem Jeffries, referring to the 
president's first day in office. "The cruelty is the point."

   With no easy endgame at hand, the standoff risks dragging deeper into 
October, when federal workers who remain on the job will begin missing 
paychecks. The nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office has estimated roughly 
750,000 federal workers would be furloughed on any given day during the 
shutdown, a loss of $400 million daily in wages.

   The economic effects could spill over into the broader economy. Past 
shutdowns saw "reduced aggregate demand in the private sector for goods and 
services, pushing down GDP," the CBO said.

   "Stalled federal spending on goods and services led to a loss of 
private-sector income that further reduced demand for other goods and services 
in the economy," it said. Overall CBO said there was a "dampening of economic 
output," but that reversed once people returned to work.

   "The longer this goes on, the more pain will be inflicted," said House 
Speaker Mike Johnson, R-La., "because it is inevitable when the government 
shuts down."

   Trump and the congressional leaders are not expected to meet again soon. 
Congress has no action scheduled Thursday in observance of the Jewish holy day, 
with senators due back Friday. The House is set to resume session next week.

   The Democrats are holding fast to their demands to preserve health care 
funding, and refusing to back a bill that fails to do so, warning of price 
spikes for millions of Americans nationwide. The Kaiser Family Foundation 
estimates insurance premiums will more than double for people who buy policies 
on the Affordable Care Act exchanges.

   The Republicans have opened a door to negotiating the health care issue, but 
GOP leaders say it can wait, since the subsidies that help people purchase 
private insurance don't expire until year's end.

   "We're willing to have a conversation about ensuring that Americans continue 
to have access to health care," Vice President JD Vance said Wednesday at the 
White House.

   With Congress as a standstill, the Trump administration has taken advantage 
of new levers to determine how to shape the federal government.

   The Trump administration can tap into funds to pay workers at the Defense 
Department and Homeland Security from what's commonly called the "One Big 
Beautiful Bill" that was signed into law this summer, according to CBO.

   That would ensure Trump's immigration enforcement and mass deportation 
agenda is uninterrupted. But employees who remain on the job at many other 
agencies will have to wait for government to reopen before they get a paycheck.

   Already Vought, from the budget office, has challenged the authority of 
Congress this year by trying to claw back and rescind funds lawmakers had 
already approved -- for Head Start, clean energy infrastructure projects, 
overseas aid and public radio and television.

   The Government Accountability Office has issued a series of rare notices of 
instance where the administration's actions have violated the law. But the 
Supreme Court in a ruling late last week allowed the administration's so-called 
"pocket rescission" of nearly $5 billion in foreign aid to stand.