A long line of authorities – primarily within healthcare and at the tax authority IRS – have through spokespersons confirmed that a total of thousands of employees are among those affected by the Trump administration's layoffs.
On Saturday evening, Swedish time, Trump announced in social media that he "as commander-in-chief" has given Defense Minister Pete Hegseth the task of using the Department of Defense's "all available resources" to ensure that the country's soldiers receive their salary.
The military is one of the branches of the state apparatus that otherwise would have risked being without the planned paycheck on Wednesday.
Document: At least 4,100 to be laid off
Court documents show at the same time that the Trump administration plans to lay off at least 4,100 federally employed people, reports the news agency Bloomberg. At the same time, the Trump administration is said to have declared that they plan to lay off more than that.
The shutdown – where large parts of the state apparatus in the USA have been shut down and hundreds of thousands of employees have been furloughed without pay since the turn of the month September-October – is a result of the Senate not being able to agree on a budget for the new fiscal year that began in October.
Historically, layoffs have not been used as a tool in connection with shutdowns.
The idea is to get rid of employees who work with federal services that the Democrats want or employees that the Democrats want to keep, according to Trump.
Turned to court
Union representatives have requested that a court immediately stop the Trump administration's mass layoffs, but the court will not take up this issue until October 15, according to what has been said so far.
Democrat Chuck Schumer, minority leader in the Senate, writes in a critical comment:
"Let's be clear: no one is forcing Trump and Vought to do this. They don't have to do this, they want to".
Russell Vought is the White House budget chief.
