WASHINGTON:&nbsp;The White House said on Friday it had begun mass layoffs of federal workers as President Donald Trump sought to amp up pressure on opposition Democrats to end a government shutdown that has crippled public services. With the crisis set to go into a third week and no off-ramp in sight, Trump&#39;s budget chief Russ Vought announced on social media that the administration had begun following through on threats to fire some of the 750,000 public servants placed on enforced leave. The Office of Management and Budget, headed by Vought, told AFP the layoffs would be &quot;substantial,&quot; but gave no precise numbers or details of which departments would be most affected. The president has repeatedly emphasized that he views cutbacks as a way of increasing pain on Democrats, and said last week he was meeting Vought to determine which of &quot;the many Democrat Agencies, most of which are a political SCAM&quot; should be targeted. Democratic leaders in Congress have dismissed the threats as an attempt at intimidation and say mass firings would not stand up in court. &quot;Russell Vought just fired thousands of Americans with a tweet,&quot; the party&#39;s leader in the Senate, Chuck Schumer, said in a statement berating the White House for wreaking &quot;deliberate chaos.&quot; &quot;Let&#39;s be blunt: nobody&#39;s forcing Trump and Vought to do this. They don&#39;t have to do it; they want to,&quot; he fumed. &quot;They&#39;re callously choosing to hurt people &mdash; the workers who protect our country, inspect our food, respond when disasters strike.&quot; Unions representing 800,000 government employees asked a federal judge in San Francisco for an emergency order to halt the firings, ahead of a hearing set for October 16 on their legality. A US Treasury spokesperson told AFP the department had begun sending out notices of layoffs while the Health and Human Services Department said it had started firing nonessential workers &quot;as a direct consequence of the Democrat-led government shutdown.&quot; Education officials were also reducing their workforce, a source with knowledge of staffing decisions at the department told AFP. &#39;Tired of the chaos&#39;&nbsp;Public servants who hang onto their jobs still face the misery of going without pay while the crisis remains unresolved, with the standoff expected to drag on until at least the middle of next week. Adding to the pain, 1.3 million active-duty service military personnel are set to miss their pay due next Wednesday &mdash; something that has not happened in any of the funding shutdowns through modern history. &quot;We&#39;re not in a good mood here in the Capitol &mdash; it&#39;s a somber day,&quot; Republican House Speaker Mike Johnson said at a news conference marking the 10th day of the shutdown. Nonessential government work stopped after the September 30 funding deadline, with Senate Democrats repeatedly blocking a Republican resolution to reopen federal agencies. The sticking point has been a refusal by Republicans to include language in the bill to address expiring subsidies that make health insurance affordable for 24 million Americans. With a prolonged shutdown looking more likely each day, members of Congress have been looking to Trump to step in and break the deadlock. But the president has been largely tuned out, with his focus on the Gaza ceasefire deal and sending federal troops to bolster his mass deportation drive in Democratic-led cities such as Chicago and Portland. &quot;The American people are sick and tired of the chaos, crisis and confusion that has been visited upon the country by Donald Trump and Republican complete control of Congress,&quot; House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries told a news conference. The Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) meanwhile announced it would delay publication of key inflation data due next week to October 24, with the shutdown logjamming government data releases. The consumer price index data is being published to allow the Social Security Administration to &quot;ensure the accurate and timely payment of benefits,&quot; it said.

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President Trump has emphasized he views cutbacks as a way of increasing pain on Democrats, has said he met Vought to determine which of "the many Democrat Agencies, most of which are a political SCAM" should be targeted.

White House says 'substantial' shutdown layoffs have begun

Reuters

WASHINGTON: The White House on Monday backed off President Donald Trump&#39;s assertion that government employees were already being laid off due to the shutdown, but warned job losses could result as the standoff looked set to stretch into a seventh day. The Republican-led Senate for a fifth time rejected dueling measures to fund federal agencies, with insufficient support for both a Republican proposal to fund operations through November 21 and a Democratic version that would also extend healthcare subsidies due to expire at the end of the year. Trump told reporters at the White House that he would be open to a deal on the subsidies, which help 24 million people buy health insurance through the Affordable Care Act &mdash; a law that Republicans bitterly opposed for years. Shoring up the expiring subsidies has been the Democrats&#39; main demand and primary reason for voting against the Republican plan. But on the sixth day of the shutdown, the Republican president and top Senate Democrat Chuck Schumer could not even agree whether the two sides were talking, with Trump saying there were negotiations ongoing and Schumer saying there weren&#39;t. The Republican-led House of Representatives was not in session, and House Speaker Mike Johnson said he had no plans to reopen it until the government was funded. The standoff has frozen about $1.7 trillion in funds for agency operations, which amounts to roughly one-quarter of annual federal spending. Much of the remainder goes to health and retirement programs and interest payments on the growing $37.88 trillion debt. Backtracking on layoffsDuring the shutdown&#39;s first week, the Trump administration cut off some federal funds to Democratic-led cities and states and continued to raise the specter of mass firings, though none appeared to be forthcoming. Previous shutdowns have not forced the government to fire any workers, though hundreds of thousands are typically told not to work. Trump said on Sunday night that layoffs were taking place &quot;right now,&quot; but White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt said on Monday he had been referring to those furloughed since Congress allowed funding to expire on October 1. The White House budget office &quot;is continuing to work with agencies on who, unfortunately, is going to have to be laid off if this shutdown continues,&quot; she said at a news briefing. Labor unions representing federal workers have sued to prevent that from happening, arguing that such layoffs would violate a law that includes criminal penalties. The administration has already frozen at least $28 billion in infrastructure funds for New York, California and Illinois &mdash; all home to sizable Democratic populations and critics of the president. But Democratic leaders showed no sign of knuckling under to the White House&#39;s hardball tactics, which have caused unease among some centrist Republicans who fear the approach could make the impasse harder to overcome. The partial shutdown, the 15th since 1981, was on track to stand alone as the fourth-longest in US history on Tuesday, exceeding the six-day length of a 1995 shutdown. The longest shutdown lasted 35 days in 2018-2019, during Trump&#39;s first term in office. While border guards, airport security screeners, and other &quot;essential&quot; employees remained on the job without pay, other government activities ground to a halt. The Federal Register, which typically lists more than 100 proposed regulations and other notices daily, only showed four entries on Monday morning. Pressure to end the standoff could mount next week, when 1.3 million troops and other military workers are due to miss their paychecks for the first time since the shutdown began. Air travel could be another factor. More of the nation&#39;s 13,000 air traffic controllers have been calling in sick since the shutdown began, which could lead to flight delays, Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy said. Lawmakers resolved the last shutdown in 2019 after absences of controllers and airport security screeners spiked. Republicans hold a 53-47 Senate majority but need the votes of at least eight Democrats to meet the chamber&#39;s 60-vote threshold for most legislation, since Republican Senator Rand Paul opposes the stopgap funding measure. So far, only two Democrats and an independent who caucuses with them have crossed the aisle. Some Democrats want a deal on healthcare subsidies in place before open enrollment for next year begins on November 1. Johnson said a solution could not be reached quickly. &quot;We&#39;ve got probably 100 ideas for reforms on the table, but I can&#39;t snap my fingers this afternoon and make that happen,&quot; he said on the Hugh Hewitt radio show.

The Republican-led Senate, for a fifth time, rejects dueling measures to fund federal agencies, with insufficient support for both a Republican proposal to fund operations through November 21 and a Democratic version that would also extend healthcare subsidies due to expire at the end of the year.



White House says no shutdown-related layoffs yet, but warns they could come

WASHINGTON: The government shutdown that began Wednesday will deprive policymakers and investors of economic data vital to their decision-making at a time of unusual uncertainty about the direction of the US economy. The absence will be felt almost immediately, as the government&#39;s monthly jobs report scheduled for release on Friday will likely be delayed. A weekly report on the number of Americans seeking unemployment benefits &mdash; a proxy for layoffs that is typically published on Thursdays &mdash; will also be postponed. If the shutdown is short-lived, it won&rsquo;t be very disruptive. But if the release of economic data is delayed for several weeks or longer, it could pose challenges, particularly for the Federal Reserve. The Fed is grappling with where to set a key interest rate at a time of conflicting signals, with inflation running above its 2% target and hiring nearly ground to a halt, driving the unemployment rate higher in August. The Fed typically cuts this rate when unemployment rises, but raises it &mdash; or at least leaves it unchanged &mdash; when inflation is growing too quickly. The Fed may have little new federal economic data to analyze by its next meeting on Oct. 28-29, when it is widely expected to reduce its rate again. &ldquo;The job market had been a source of real strength in the economy, but has been slowing down considerably the past few months,&rdquo; said Michael Linden, senior policy fellow at the left-leaning Washington Center for Equitable Growth. &ldquo;It would be very good to know if that slowdown was continuing, accelerating, or reversing.&rdquo; The Fed cut its rate by a quarter-point earlier this month and signaled it was likely to do so twice more this year. Fed officials said they would keep a close eye on how inflation and unemployment evolve, but this depends on the availability of the data. A key inflation report is scheduled for Oct. 15, and the government&#39;s monthly retail sales report is slated for release the next day. &ldquo;We&#39;re in a meeting-by-meeting situation, and we&rsquo;re going to be looking at the data,&rdquo; Fed Chair Jerome Powell said during a news conference earlier this month. The economic picture has recently gotten cloudier. Despite slower hiring, there are signs that overall economic growth may be picking up. Consumers have stepped up their shopping, and the Federal Reserve Bank of Atlanta estimates the economy likely expanded at a healthy clip in the July-September quarter, after a significant gain in the April-June period. A key question for the Fed is whether that growth can revive the job market, which this Friday&rsquo;s report might have helped illustrate. Economists had forecast another month of weak hiring, with just 50,000 new positions added, according to a survey by FactSet. The unemployment rate was projected to stay at a still-low 4.3%. On Wall Street, investors closely follow the monthly jobs reports, typically released on the first Friday of every month. It&#39;s a crucial indicator of the economy&#39;s health, providing insights into how the Fed might adjust interest rates, which in turn affects the cost of borrowing and influences how investors allocate their money. So far, investors don&rsquo;t seem fazed by the shutdown. The broad S&amp;P 500 stock index rose slightly on Wednesday to an all-time high. Many businesses also rely on government data to gauge the state of the economy. The Commerce Department&#39;s monthly report on retail sales, for example, provides a comprehensive look at the health of US consumers and can influence whether companies plan to expand or shrink their operations and workforces. For the time being, the Fed, economists, and investors will likely focus more on private data. On Wednesday, the payroll provider ADP issued its monthly employment data, which showed that businesses cut 32,000 jobs in September &mdash; a signal the economy is slowing. Still, ADP chief economist Nela Richardson said her firm&#39;s report &ldquo;was not intended to be a replacement&rdquo; for government statistics. The ADP data does not capture what&#39;s happening at government agencies, for example, an area of the economy that could be significantly affected by a lengthy shutdown. &ldquo;Using a portfolio of private sector and government data gives you a better chance of capturing a very complicated economy in a complex world,&rdquo; she said. The Fed will remain open regardless of how long the shutdown lasts, as it funds itself through earnings on the government bonds and other securities it owns. It will continue to provide its monthly snapshots of industrial production, which includes mining, manufacturing, and utility output. The following industrial production report will be released on Oct. 17.

A government shutdown delays key economic data, hindering the Fed and investors amid uncertainty. Without jobs and inflation reports, decision-making is harder, though private data offers limited insight during this critical economic period.

Articles tagged with "US Shutdown"

White House says 'substantial' shutdown layoffs have begun

White House says no shutdown-related layoffs yet, but warns they could come

Federal shutdown cuts off economic data vital to policymakers and investors