Vance blames Democrats for shutdown with false claims as White House warns of layoffs

US vice-president JD Vance used false claims to fault Democrats for the government shutdown, while the White House warned that worker layoffs were imminent.

Federal departments began closing at midnight after Congress failed to pass a funding measure. The stakes are higher than in previous shutdowns, with Donald Trump moving to shrink government departments and threatening to turn furloughs into mass firings.

Making a rare appearance in the White House briefing room, Vance told reporters: “We are going to have to lay some people off if the shutdown continues. We don’t like that. We don’t necessarily want to do it, but we’re going to do what we have to do to keep the American people’s essential services continuing to run.”

He denied that workers would be targeted for political reasons but conceded there was uncertainty over who might be laid off or furloughed.

“We haven’t made any final decisions about what we’re going to do with certain workers,” he said. “What we’re saying is that we might have to take extraordinary steps, especially the longer this goes on.”

Roughly 750,000 federal employees are expected to be furloughed with pay withheld until they return. Essential workers, including military and border agents, may work without pay and some are likely to miss paychecks next week.

At the same briefing, press secretary Karoline Leavitt said agencies are already preparing for cuts.

“Unfortunately, because the Democrats shut down the government, the president has directed his cabinet, and the office of management and budget is working with agencies across the board, to identify where cuts can be made – and we believe that layoffs are imminent,” she said. She offered no timeline or estimate of the share of workers affected.

As the messaging fight intensifies, Democrats—motivated by grassroots anger over expiring healthcare subsidies—have been withholding Senate votes to fund the government as leverage to force negotiations.

Vance criticized Democrats’ demands, singling out Senate minority leader Chuck Schumer and congresswoman Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez.

“The Chuck Schumer-AOC wing of the Democratic party shut down the government because they said to us, we will open the government only if you give billions of dollars of funding to healthcare for illegal aliens. That’s a ridiculous proposition.”

That assertion is false: US law bars undocumented immigrants from receiving the healthcare benefits Democrats are seeking, and the party has not called for new legislation to change that.

On Capitol Hill, House minority leader Hakeem Jeffries said Trump and Republicans shut the government down to deny healthcare to working-class Americans. “The president has been engaging in irresponsible and unserious behaviour, demonstrating that, all along, Republicans wanted to shut the government down,” he said.

“That’s no surprise, because for decades, Republicans have consistently shut the government down as part of their efforts to try to extract and jam their extreme rightwing agenda down the throats of the American people.”

Separately, the White House began targeting Democratic-leaning states for a pause or cancellation of infrastructure funds. Russ Vought, the OMB director, wrote on X that about $18bn for New York City infrastructure projects had been put on hold to ensure funding is not flowing to “unconstitutional DEI principles”.

He later said nearly $8bn in clean-energy funding “to fuel the Left’s climate agenda is being cancelled.”

Schumer and Jeffries replied in a joint statement: “Donald Trump is once again treating working people as collateral damage in his endless campaign of chaos and revenge.”

Shutdowns periodically hit gridlocked Washington, but this is the first since the record 35-day lapse in 2018-19 during Trump’s first term.

Talks have been unusually bitter, with Trump mocking Schumer and Jeffries on social media. His latest video showed Jeffries on MSNBC with an AI-generated moustache and sombrero, and four depictions of the president playing mariachi music.

Vance downplayed the episode.

“I think it’s funny. The president’s joking and we’re having a good time. You can negotiate in good faith while also making a little bit of fun at some of the absurdities of the Democrats’ positions, and even poking some fun at the absurdity of the themselves.

I’ll tell Hakeem Jeffries right now, I make the solemn promise to you that if you help us reopen the government, the sombrero memes will stop. I’ve talked to the president of the United States about that.”

Jeffries called the memes racist.

Vance replied: “I honestly don’t even know what that means. Like, is he a Mexican American that is offended by having a sombrero meme?”

Efforts to end the shutdown collapsed on Wednesday, as Senate Democrats—demanding extended healthcare subsidies for low-income families—refused to help the Republican majority advance a House-passed bill that would have reopened the government for several weeks.

Congress is out on Thursday for the Jewish holiday of Yom Kippur; the Senate returns Friday and may work through the weekend, while the House is not due back until next week.

A Marist poll released Tuesday found 38% of voters would blame congressional Republicans for a shutdown, 27% would blame Democrats and 31% both parties.