{"id":306316,"date":"2025-10-15T21:08:26","date_gmt":"2025-10-15T21:08:26","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/306316\/"},"modified":"2025-10-15T21:08:26","modified_gmt":"2025-10-15T21:08:26","slug":"federal-workers-endure-financial-strain-and-fear-layoffs-as-the-government-shutdown-drags-on","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/306316\/","title":{"rendered":"Federal workers endure financial strain and fear layoffs as the government shutdown drags on"},"content":{"rendered":"

By Fatima Hussein, Joey Cappelletti, Jesse Bedayn and Safiyah Riddle, <\/strong>The Associated Press<\/p>\n

WASHINGTON \u2014<\/strong> With every passing day of\u00a0the government shutdown<\/a>, hundreds of thousands of federal employees furloughed or working without pay face mounting financial strain. And now they are confronting new uncertainty with\u00a0the Trump administration\u2019s promised layoffs<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Little progress has been made to end\u00a0the shutdown<\/a>\u00a0as it enters its third week, with Republicans and Democrats digging in and convinced their messaging is resonating with voters. The fate of the federal workers is among\u00a0several pressure points<\/a>\u00a0that could eventually push the sides to agree to resolve the stalemate.<\/p>\n

\u201cLuckily I was able to pay rent this month,\u201d said Peter Farruggia, a furloughed federal worker. \u201cBut for sure I am going to have bills that are going to go unpaid this month, and I really don\u2019t have many options.\u201d<\/p>\n

The shutdown has a familiar feel for many federal employees who endured past stalemates \u2014 including during President Donald Trump\u2019s first term \u2014 but this time, the stakes are higher. The Republican White House is leveraging federal workers\u2019 jobs to pressure Democrats to soften their demands.<\/p>\n

The shutdown\u00a0began on Oct. 1<\/a>\u00a0after Democrats rejected a short-term funding fix and demanded that the bill include an extension of\u00a0federal subsidies for health insurance<\/a>\u00a0under the Affordable Care Act. Trump and other Republican leaders have said the government must reopen before they will negotiate with Democrats on the health subsidies.<\/p>\n

There are 55,000 federal workers in Colorado alone.<\/p>\n

Trump administration launches wave of layoffs<\/p>\n

Farruggia is the head of the American Federation of Government Employees local representing employees at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, an agency that faced a wave of layoffs over the weekend. Like 8,000 other CDC employees who have been furloughed from the agency, he was already living paycheck to paycheck, and the partial pay that arrived Friday was his last until the government comes back online.<\/p>\n

With\u00a0the agency\u2019s leadership<\/a>\u00a0in turmoil and still\u00a0rattled from a shooting<\/a>, the shutdown and\u00a0new firings<\/a>\u00a0mean \u201cpeople are scared, nervous, anxious, but also really just exasperated,\u201d Farruggia said.<\/p>\n

After\u00a0Russ Vought<\/a>, the director of the Office of Management and Budget, said last week on social media that the \u201cRIFs have begun,\u201d referring to reduction-in-force plans aimed at\u00a0reducing the size<\/a>\u00a0of the federal government, Vice President JD Vance doubled down on the threat Sunday, saying \u201cthe longer this goes on, the deeper the cuts are going to be.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"\"The Capitol is seen under gray skies on the thirteenth day of the government shutdown, in Washington, Monday, Oct. 13, 2025. (AP Photo\/J. Scott Applewhite)<\/p>\n

The layoffs have begun\u00a0across federal agencies<\/a>. Labor unions have already filed a lawsuit to stop the move by Trump\u2019s budget office.<\/p>\n

In a court filing on Friday, the Office of Management and Budget said well over 4,000 federal employees from eight departments and agencies would be fired in conjunction with the shutdown.<\/p>\n

Jessica Sweet, an Albany, New York, Social Security claims specialist who is a union steward of AFGE Local 3343 in New York, said, \u201cI, myself, have a backup plan\u201d in case she is fired during the shutdown, \u201cbut I know most people don\u2019t.\u201d<\/p>\n

She says the Social Security Administration is already so short-staffed from layoffs earlier this year brought on by\u00a0the Department of Government Efficiency<\/a>, she doesn\u2019t fear a massive layoff during the shutdown.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe one thing this administration has taught me is that nothing is ever for certain, even if it\u2019s codified into law,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n

Having received a partial payment in her last paycheck, Sweet has begun reaching out to her local power companies to request that she not get charged late fees, since \u201cmy bills won\u2019t wait for me to eventually get paid.\u201d<\/p>\n

Shutdown drags on, and frustration grows<\/p>\n

For some federal workers, this isn\u2019t their first shutdown \u2014 the last one, during Trump\u2019s first term in 2019, stretched\u00a0a record 34 days<\/a>. But this time, federal employees are being used more directly as leverage in the political fight over government funding.<\/p>\n

The Republican administration last week warned that there would be\u00a0no guaranteed back pay<\/a>\u00a0for federal workers during a shutdown \u2014 a reversal of long-standing policy affecting roughly 750,000 furloughed employees, according to a White House memo. The move, which Trump later backtracked on, was widely seen as a strong-arm tactic.<\/p>\n

Adam Pelletier, a National Labor Relations Board field examiner whose agency furloughed nearly all of its workforce on Oct. 1, going from roughly 1,100 workers to fewer than a dozen people, said he wouldn\u2019t mind if the shutdown continued if it meant meaningful progress toward gaining health care protections for Americans across the country \u2014\u00a0a key demand by Democrats<\/a>\u00a0for ending the stalemate.<\/p>\n

Pelletier, a union leader for NLRB local 3, said \u201cright now, nothing is being investigated at the NLRB. There\u2019s no elections for unions or elections for decertifications. Basically nothing is happening.\u201d<\/p>\n

As for the financial strain on workers, he said workers can\u2019t even find alternate employment to weather the shutdown because \u201cthe ethics office that would approve of those requests is not staffed now.\u201d<\/p>\n

Workers used as \u201cpolitical pawns\u201d<\/p>\n

National Treasury Employees Union President Doreen Greenwald, which represents workers across dozens of federal agencies, said several of the union\u2019s members had been laid off as of Friday. The Treasury Department would lose 1,446 workers, according to the filing.<\/p>\n

Greenwald said it was unfortunate that the Trump administration was using \u201cfederal employees as political pawns by furloughing and proposing to fire them all to try to cause pressure in a political game of chicken.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cThis isn\u2019t about one party or the other. It\u2019s about real people,\u201d said Everett Kelley, president of the American Federation of Government Employees.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe correction officer worrying about his next paycheck. The TSA officer who still shows up to work because he or she loves their country, even though they\u2019re not getting paid. No American should ever have to choose between serving their country and feeding their family,\u201d Kelley said.<\/p>\n

\"\"A Transportation Security Administration worker heads into the east security checkpoint in Denver International Airport Thursday, Oct. 2, 2025, in Denver. (AP Photo\/David Zalubowski)<\/p>\n

Kelley and other major federal worker union leaders gathered blocks from the Capitol last week, urging congressional leaders to find a solution and put \u201cpeople over politics.\u201d The event grew emotional at times, with union heads outlining the difficulties facing their members and the stakes growing daily.<\/p>\n

Randy Erwin, president of the National Federation of Federal Employees, which represents 110,000 workers nationwide, called on both sides of Congress to find a resolution. He said Trump appeared to aim to \u201cdegrade, frighten, antagonize hardworking federal employees.\u201d<\/p>\n

Chris Bartley, political program coordinator for the International Association of Fire Fighters, said thousands of firefighters were showing up for work without pay out of a sense of devotion but stressed that could have broader consequences.<\/p>\n

\u201cFamilies go without income,\u201d Bartley said. \u201cMorale and retention suffer. Public safety is compromised.\u201d<\/p>\n

___<\/p>\n

Bedayn reported from Denver, and Riddle reported from Montgomery, Ala. The Colorado Sun contributed to this report.<\/p>\n

Type of Story: News Service<\/p>\n

Produced externally by an organization we trust to adhere to high journalistic standards.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"By Fatima Hussein, Joey Cappelletti, Jesse Bedayn and Safiyah Riddle, The Associated Press WASHINGTON \u2014 With every passing…\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":306317,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[14],"tags":[1578,64,17177,420,98499,67,132,68,9924],"class_list":{"0":"post-306316","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-jobs","8":"tag-associated-press","9":"tag-business","10":"tag-federal-workers","11":"tag-jobs","12":"tag-shutdown","13":"tag-united-states","14":"tag-unitedstates","15":"tag-us","16":"tag-wire"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@us\/115380231320412803","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/306316","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=306316"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/306316\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/306317"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=306316"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=306316"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=306316"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}