Reference News Network, October 11 - According to AFP, on October 10, the White House said it had begun a large-scale layoff of federal employees. US President Donald Trump is trying to pressure Democratic opponents to end the government shutdown that has caused public services to be paralyzed.
As this crisis continues into its third week without any signs of relief, Russell Work, the president's budget director, announced on social media that the government is implementing previous threats, laying off some of the 750,000 furloughed civil servants.
The Office of Management and Budget, led by Work, told AFP that the scale of the layoffs will be "significant," but did not provide specific numbers or details on which departments are most affected.
A court filing on October 10 showed that the government has already laid off more than 4,000 federal employees, with over 1,000 each in the Department of the Treasury and the Department of Health and Human Services.
Trump reiterated that he would use the layoffs to pressure Democrats. He told reporters that the number of people being fired would be "large," and mainly target Democrats, as "we believe they started this."
Democratic leaders in Congress criticized these threats as just intimidation and said that large-scale layoffs would not hold up in court.
A union representing 800,000 government employees applied to a federal judge in San Francisco for an emergency order to suspend the layoffs before a hearing on the legality of the layoffs scheduled for October 16.
A spokesperson for the US Treasury told AFP that the department has begun sending layoff notices. The Department of Health and Human Services stated that it has begun firing non-essential staff, calling it "a direct consequence of the Democratic-led government shutdown." (Translated by Qing Songzhu)
Original: https://www.toutiao.com/article/7559847816814690855/
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