WASHINGTON – The White House said on Friday that it had begun substantial layoffs across the U.S. government, as President Donald Trump followed through on a threat to cut the federal workforce during the government shutdown.

Job cuts were under way at the Treasury Department, the U.S. health agency and the departments of education, commerce, and Homeland Security’s cybersecurity division, spokespeople said, but the total extent of the layoffs was not immediately clear. Roughly 300,000 federal civilian workers had already been set to leave their jobs this year due to a downsizing campaign initiated earlier this year by Trump.

“The RIFs have begun,” White House budget director Russell Vought wrote on social media, referring to so-called reductions in force. A spokesperson for the budget office characterized the cuts as “substantial,” without offering further details.

Trump has repeatedly threatened to fire federal workers during the shutdown standoff, in its 10th day on Friday, and has suggested his administration will aim primarily at parts of the government championed by Democrats.

He has ordered the freezing of at least $28 billion in infrastructure funds for New York, California and Illinois – all home to sizable populations of Democratic voters and critics of the administration.

Democratic votes needed to end shutdown

Trump’s Republicans hold majorities in both chambers of Congress, but need at least seven Democratic votes to pass a funding bill in the Senate, where Democrats are holding out for an extension of health-insurance subsidies.

Democrats said they will not cave to Trump’s pressure tactics.

“Until Republicans get serious, they own this – every job lost, every family hurt, every service gutted is because of their decisions,” Senate Democratic Leader Chuck Schumer said.

Labor unions representing federal workers have sued to stop the layoffs, saying they would be illegal during a shutdown.

A federal judge is due to hear the case on October 16.

The government is required by law to give workers 60 days’ notice ahead of any layoffs, though that can be shortened to 30 days.

Targeting furloughed workers

The announcement of the layoffs came on the same day that many federal workers were due to get reduced paychecks that do not include any pay for the days since the shutdown began. Hundreds of thousands have been ordered not to report to work, while others have been ordered to keep working without pay. The nation’s 2 million active-duty troops will miss their Oct. 15 paycheck entirely if the shutdown is not resolved before then.

Employees across multiple divisions of the Department of Health and Human Services have received layoff notices, communications director Andrew Nixon said. The 78,000 workers at the sprawling agency monitor disease outbreaks, fund medical research, and perform a wide range of other health-related duties.

Nixon said the layoffs were targeted at agency staff who have been ordered not to work, but did not provide further details. Roughly 41% of agency staff have been furloughed, including three out of four workers at the National Institutes of Health and two out of three employees at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, according to government shutdown plans. 

The layoffs do not include the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services, which oversees several major public insurance programs, according to an employee familiar with the matter.

Layoffs have also begun at the Treasury Department, according to a spokesperson who requested anonymity.

A labor union official, Thomas Huddleston of the American Federation of Government Employees, said in a court filing he had been told Treasury was preparing 1,300 layoff notices. Those layoffs could hit the tax-collecting Internal Revenue Service, which has been targeted for steep job cuts this year. Some 46% of the agency’s 78,000 employees were furloughed on Wednesday.

Officials also confirmed job cuts at the Education Department, which Trump has vowed to shutter completely, and the Commerce Department, which handles weather forecasting, economic data reports, and other tasks.

Other media outlets reported layoffs at the Environmental Protection Agency, the Department of Energy, the Department of Interior, and the Department of Housing and Urban Development. Spokespeople at those agencies did not immediately respond to requests for comment.

The Department of Homeland Security said layoffs were taking place at the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency, which incurred Trump’s wrath after the 2020 election when its director said there was no evidence voting systems were compromised. Trump claims that he lost that election to Democrat Joe Biden due to voter fraud.

“This is part of getting CISA back on mission,” DHS spokesperson Tricia McLaughlin said.

The Department of Transportation and the Federal Aviation Administration are not affected, according to a source familiar with the situation. 

Colorado was home to about 54,000 federal jobs in August, not including any military personnel, according to the Colorado Department of Labor and Employment.

The number of federal jobs is at it’s lowest level since 1990, at less than 2%, data from the University of Colorado Boulder, Leeds School of Business shows.

A drop in the number of federal jobs was expected in October because the paychecks going out as part of the deferred resignation programs were set to end on Sept. 30, said Brian Lewandowski, executive director of the business research division at the Leeds School of Business at the University of Colorado Boulder.

Since the shutdown started on Oct. 1, 619 federal employees have filed for unemployment benefits, of the 1,806 employees that have filed since President Donald Trump took office, the office’s data shows.

Furloughed federal employees are eligible for unemployment through the state, but must pay those benefits back when they receive back pay, according to CDLE.

The largest group of employees applying for benefits either previously worked for or are furloughed from the Department of Agriculture and represent 14.9% of claims. Claims from Treasury and IRS workers make up the second largest group with 8.8% of the claims or 127 people, state data shows.

The Department of Agriculture includes the Forest Service, which manages 11.3 million forested acres in the state.

Gazette reporter Mary Shinn contributed to this report