On Day 10 of the government shutdown, White House budget director Russell Vought announced that the mass firings of federal workers have begun, dramatically escalating the pain of the political standoff, which is set to continue into next week with no sign of a resolution.
Vought, the man depicted as the Grim Reaper in a video shared last week by President Donald Trump, posted his own grim, four-word message on social media: “The RIFs have begun,” he wrote midday, using the abbreviation for “reductions in force.”
While past shutdowns have seen federal workers only furloughed, not fired, Vought and Trump had warned that painful cuts would be coming this time, and they indicated that policy and program areas backed by Democrats would be targeted while Trump’s priorities would be protected.
“We’re only cutting Democrat programs, I hate to tell you, but we are cutting Democrat programs,” Trump said at a Cabinet meeting on Thursday. “We will be cutting some very popular Democrat programs that aren’t popular with Republicans, frankly.”
Trump on Friday evening said that the number of layoffs would be announced in the coming days and reiterated that the layoffs would be “Democrat-oriented,” again blaming Democrats for the shutdown. “They started this thing,” he said.
Vought provided no further details on Friday, but an Office of Management and Budget spokesperson told Politico that the job cuts “are substantial.” Among the departments and agencies where employees reportedly have been laid off: Commerce, Education, Energy, the Environmental Protection Agency, Health and Human Services, Homeland Security, Housing and Urban Development, Interior and Treasury. In all, thousands of workers stand to lose their jobs.
“I think they held off as long as they could,” Senate Majority Leader John Thune told reporters.
But Democrats slammed the cuts as unprecedented and entirely unnecessary.
“Let’s be clear: Republicans aren’t laying off hardworking Americans because they have to. It’s because they want to. All to pay for billionaires’ tax cuts,” House Democratic Whip Katherine Clark said. “This is all the same story. Slashing health care. Taking away people’s jobs. Even withholding troops’ paychecks. Republicans will continue to make life harder and more expensive for regular people at every turn.”
Senate Democratic Leader Chuck Schumer also noted that Trump and Vought don’t have to fire anyone but are choosing to do so. “This is deliberate chaos,” he said. “Here's what's worse: Republicans would rather see thousands of Americans lose their jobs than sit down and negotiate with Democrats to reopen the government.”
Sen. Susan Collins, the top Republican appropriator in the Senate, also came out against the OMB firings, though she also blamed Schumer for the ongoing shutdown. “Arbitrary layoffs result in a lack of sufficient personnel needed to conduct the mission of the agency and to deliver essential programs, and cause harm to families in Maine and throughout our country,” she said in a statement.
The American Federation of Government Employees and other unions representing federal workers have already filed suit to stop the mass firings.
“It is disgraceful that the Trump administration has used the government shutdown as an excuse to illegally fire thousands of workers who provide critical services to communities across the country,” AFGE National President Everett Kelley said. “These workers show up every day to serve the American people, and for the past nine months have been met with nothing but cruelty and viciousness from President Trump. Every single American citizen should be outraged.”
Bipartisanship isn’t dead yet: The Senate on Thursday voted down dueling Republican and Democratic government funding bills for a seventh time — but it did manage to break another lengthy impasse and pass its version of the fiscal 2026 National Defense Authorization Act, the massive, must-pass defense policy bill, which sets a $924.7 billion military funding target for the year. The bipartisan 77-20 vote late Thursday clears the way for House and Senate panels to negotiate a final compromise bill.
The Senate then left town until Tuesday, ensuring that the shutdown will stretch into next week at the very least.
Johnson sticks to his strategy: House lawmakers will be gone even longer. Speaker Mike Johnson announced another “district work period” from October 14 to 19, meaning that the House will be out for a fourth straight week. The chamber has not held votes since September 19.
As the shutdown drags on, it appears increasingly certain that military troops won’t get their October 15 paychecks. A Democratic attempt at passing a bill by unanimous consent to have active-duty military members paid was blocked by Republicans during the House’s brief pro forma session on Friday.
Johnson has insisted that the House has done its part to ensure that troops get paid by passing a seven-week spending bill last month. That bill was blocked in the Senate, and Johnson this week nixed the idea of a standalone measure to pay troops. Johnson has also refused to swear in Adelita Grijalva, the Arizona Democrat who won a September 23 special election to become the newest member of the House. Grijalva would be the 218th member of Congress to sign a discharge petition forcing a vote to release the files related to the Jeffrey Epstein case.
What’s next: More of the same, it seems. Democratic leaders continue to press for negotiations to extend expiring healthcare subsidies. Republican leaders continue to insist that any such talks can happen only after the government reopens. Senate Majority Leader John Thune reportedly moved this week to prevent further votes on the Democratic plan to fund the government through the end of the month — perhaps another example of the tensions and frustrations seen boiling over in the halls of Congress at several points this week.
A near-term breakthrough to end the shutdown appears improbable if not impossible, especially given that President Trump has yet to deeply engage on the standoff, allowing Thune and Johnson to take the lead on the GOP side while he focuses on the Gaza peace deal and deploys National Guard troops to major U.S. cities. Trump is planning to head to the Middle East on Sunday and told reporters he will “probably be there” when the remaining Israeli hostages are released on Monday or Tuesday.