WASHINGTON – President Donald Trump continued to up the stakes in his battle with congressional Democrats over the ongoing shutdown, saying some furloughed federal workers “don’t deserve” back pay once the government reopens its doors.
With no funding deal in sight, a new draft memo circulating in the White House says furloughed workers are not entitled to recoup their missed paychecks, according to an administration official.
That’s despite Trump signing a 2019 law to provide back pay for furloughed workers after shutdowns, and earlier guidance sent out by his own administration saying the pay would be provided.
The White House legal analysis is emerging as another point of leverage as Trump and congressional Republicans try to force Democrats to agree to their government funding plan, which is expected to face additional Senate votes after failing five times.
Trump also has threatened mass layoffs and widespread cuts to government programs. His administration is freezing or cutting roughly $26 billion in federal projects for blue states and cities. Layoffs have yet to occur. Trump said Tuesday that they could happen by the end of the week.
Trump promotes crime-fighting as fatal shootings continue
Trump promoted the reduction in crime as he met Tuesday with Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney, but the DC police blotter tells a different story.
“There’s no crime in DC,” Trump told reporters in the Oval Office, after he deployed the National Guard to help patrol the city. “Nobody’s being shot.”
But DC’s Metropolitan Police Department is investigating at least three fatal shootings since the federal government shut down Oct. 1, amid other shootings and carjackings. The incidents include:
- A shooting Oct. 5 at a home along Minnesota Avenue, where officers found a 33-year-old woman shot dead.
- An Oct. 4 shooting along Clifton Street, where officers found a 26-year-old man who suffered a gunshot wound not breathing. A 35-year-old suspect was charged with murder.
- An Oct. 3 shooting along Rhode Island Avenue, where police found a 17-year-old boy suffering a gunshot wound and not breathing.
Virginia candidate rips Trump over withholding back pay threat
Virginia Democratic gubernatorial candidate Abigail Spanberger pounced on Trump’s threat to withhold back pay from federal workers amid the ongoing government shutdown.
Spangberger, who previously represented a northern Virginia district in the House, said federal workers in the state have devoted their careers to caring for seniors, supporting military veterans and keeping Americans safe.
“President Trump is punishing Virginians for his own refusal to work in good faith to end this shutdown,” she said. “Withholding backpay would do nothing to strengthen our country – and would be a further attack on Virginians’ livelihoods.”
Virginia is one of the top states in terms of federal workers, with about 10% of residents employed by the federal government, and that issue has become a hot topic in the race for governor.
Republican Winsome Earle-Sears, the state’s lieutenant governor, has defended reducing the federal workforce in the past, but she dodged discussing the shutdown’s ramifications during a Sept. 30 interview on NBC’s “Meet the Press” before Trump and the Democrats failed to reach a deal.
White House shifts tariff funds to extend low-income food program: What to know about WIC
White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt announced on social media on Tuesday that tariff funds would be used to continue paying for a food-assistance program for low-income families.
The Women, Infants and Children program was projected to run out of money this week because of the government shutdown, Leavitt said. The program provided about $7.2 billion in aid last year, according to the U.S. Department of Agriculture.
But the administration identified funds from the tariffs on steel and aluminum to keep the resource funded.“The Trump White House will not allow impoverished mothers and their babies to go hungry because of the Democrats’ political games,” Leavitt said.
Trump says some furloughed federal workers ‘don’t deserve’ back pay
Trump said some furloughed federal workers “don’t deserve” to receive back pay during the federal government shutdown.
“It depends on who we’re talking about,” Trump said Tuesday in response to a question from a reporter on back pay. “I can tell you this, the Democrats have put a lot of people in great risk and jeopardy, but it really depends on who you’re talking about.”
Trump added: “For the most part, we’re going to take care of our people. There are some people that really don’t deserve to be taken care of, and we’ll take care of them in a different way.”
The president’s remarks come as a new legal analysis from the White House says the 750,000 employees furloughed during the shutdown are not entitled to back pay when they return, an administration official told USA TODAY.
If the administration chooses to deny federal workers their pay, the White House could use the move as additional pressure for Democrats in Congress to join Republicans to fund the government. Democrats have been withholding their support as they seek policy demands related to health care.
Jeffries: 1-year extension of Obamacare subsidies is ‘nonstarter’
A one-year extension of Obamacare subsidies is not a viable shutdown off-ramp for Democrats, House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries, D-New York, said Tuesday.
“It’s a nonstarter,” he said.
Democrats have repeatedly pushed for a permanent extension of improved health insurance subsidies for low-income families through the Affordable Care Act. The tax credits, which Congress enhanced amid the pandemic, are set to expire at the end of the year.
“That Democrats are going to go along with a one-year extension from a group of people that just extended permanent tax breaks from their billionaire donors is a laughable proposition,” Jeffries said. “Permanent extension, and let’s go from there in terms of a negotiation.”
Johnson questions legality of back pay, but stresses workers should get it
Citing a “new legal analysis,” House Speaker Mike Johnson said Tuesday that some legal analysts believe furloughed federal workers aren’t entitled to back pay.
“If that is true, that should turn up the urgency and the necessity of the Democrats doing the right thing here,” he said.
He didn’t specifically say what legal opinion he was referencing, but it came after similar arguments were made in a draft memo from the White House’s Office of Management and Budget.
Johnson stressed he hopes federal workers get back pay, and President Trump has told him he feels the same way.
White House memo says furloughed workers not entitled to back pay
As the federal government furloughs thousands of workers amid the government shutdown, a draft memo from the White House says the employees are not entitled to back pay when they return, according to an administration official.
The threat of withholding pay from federal workers ups the stakes in the showdown between congressional Democrats and the White House and congressional Republicans over funding the government, although it’s not clear if the Trump administration would follow through. Axios first reported on the White House draft memo.
The nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office estimates that 750,000 federal employees could be furloughed in the shutdown. Their total daily compensation is around $400 million.
The U.S. Office of Personnel Management released a memo in September on shutdown furloughs stating workers would get paid.
“After the lapse in appropriations has ended, employees who were required to perform excepted work during the lapse will receive retroactive pay for those work periods,” the OPM memo states.
A 2019 law signed by Trump states that federal workers who are furloughed during a lapse in government funding “shall be paid for the period of the lapse.” The law states that it applies to any government funding lapse after Dec. 22, 2018.
The shutdown is playing out in the Virginia governor’s race
Trump’s moves to slash the size of the federal government earlier this year were already a focal point of Virginia’s gubernatorial contest.
The Old Dominion State has more federal workers than most and Democrats believe those simmering frustrations coupled with the ongoing government shutdown that began Oct. 1 will boil over in their favor as thousands more are now furloughed, which could slow critical services or result in mass firings.
“Our money’s kind of on hold. It’s painful,” Chris Witter, 54, a stay-at-home father of two 16-year-old girls whose wife works for the federal government.
He blamed the shutdown on Republicans, and polling shows most Americans agree.
The race between Democrat Abigail Spanberger and Republican Winsome Earle-Sears was already an election many view as the first national referendum on Trump’s agenda, but the shutdown has sent the race into overdrive.
MTG, ‘not a fan’ of Obamacare, calls for extension of subsidies
Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene, a Trump supporter who calls herself “not a fan” of Obamacare, but she joined Democrats in calling for an extension of federal subsidies under the Affordable Care Act to keep health insurance costs down.Greene, R-Georgia, said in a social media post Monday that her adult children’s insurance premiums for 2026 are poised to “DOUBLE, along with all the wonderful families and hard-working people in my district,” if the tax credits expire.
Senate Democrats have refused to reopen the government since Oct. 1 by arguing that Medicaid funding cuts should be restored and subsidies for Obamacare extended. Republicans who control Congress contend the Medicaid cuts remove undocumented immigrants and force able-bodied citizens to work for Medicaid benefits. Greene doesn’t seek to restore Medicaid cuts.
Trump and GOP congressional leaders say they can negotiate Obamacare subsidies after the government reopens and before the funding expires Dec. 31.
“I’m carving my own lane,” said Greene, who joined Congress in 2021 a decade after lawmakers created Obamacare. “And I’m absolutely disgusted that health insurance premiums will DOUBLE if the tax credits expire this year.”
Schumer disputes Trump’s claims about negotiations
Trump did not identify the Democrats who are part of the discussions. Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer rejected Trump’s claims that negotiations over health care are taking place between the president and Democrats.
“Trump’s claim isn’t true — but if he’s finally ready to work with Democrats, we’ll be at the table,” Schumer said in a statement.
The senator added: “If President Trump and Republicans are finally ready to sit down and get something done on healthcare for American families, Democrats will be there — ready to make it happen.”
Trump hasn’t followed through on threats of mass firings
Although about 750,000 federal workers have been placed on furloughs during the shutdown, Trump hasn’t followed though on his warnings of mass layoffs across the federal workforce.
The White House last week said layoffs were “imminent.” Russell Vought, the White House director of Management and Budget, told Republican lawmakers last Wednesday on Oct. 1 that reductions in force would begin in “a day or two.”
But so far, it’s been all threats and no action.
Trump on Monday said mass layoffs remain on the table. “It could,” Trump said when asked whether another defeat in the Senate of Republicans’ funding bill could lead to layoffs. “At some point it will.”
