A memorandum shared by the White House Office of Management and Budget shows that President Donald Trump’s administration is directing federal agencies to prepare for an “orderly shutdown” by developing plans to implement mass firings of government employees if Democrats in the U.S. Senate refuse to pass a continuing resolution and force a government shutdown.
“Over the past 10 fiscal years, Congress has consistently passed Continuing Resolutions (CRs) on or by September 30 on a bipartisan basis,” the Office of Management and Budget said in the memorandum, which was obtained by Politico. “Unfortunately, congressional Democrats are signaling that they intend to break this bipartisan trend and shut down the government in the coming days over a series of insane demands, including $1 trillion in new spending.”
The Office of Management and Budget explained that the U.S. House of Representatives recently passed a “clean” continuing resolution to fund the government through November 21; however, the Trump administration claimed that Senate Democrats are currently blocking the resolution “due to their partisan demands.”
The Trump administration warned that programs that did not receive “an infusion of mandatory appropriations” will “bear the brunt” of the potential government shutdown. However, the Office of Management and Budget noted that the instructions included in the memorandum would not be necessary if Congress is able to pass a “clean” continuing resolution by September 30.
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The White House directed federal agencies to identify programs that will lack discretionary funding after the September 30 deadline and to draft reduction-in-force (RIF) plans to permanently remove positions in the government if a shutdown occurs.
“Once fiscal year 2026 appropriations are enacted, agencies should revise their RIFs as needed to retain the minimal number of employees necessary to carry out statutory functions,” the memorandum stated. “Any proposed RIF plan must be submitted to OMB.”
The White House memorandum comes after the president announced in a Truth Social post on Wednesday that he would not be meeting with Democrat leaders due to their “unserious and ridiculous demands” for the continuing resolution funding.
Trump warned that Democrats were “threatening” to shut the government down unless Republicans agreed to more than $1 trillion in additional spending to give “free healthcare for Illegal Aliens (A monumental cost!), force Taxpayers to fund Transgender surgery for minors, have dead people on the Medicaid roles, allow Illegal Alien Criminals to steal Billions of Dollars in American Taxpayer Benefits, try to force our Country to again open our Borders to Criminals and to the World, allow men to play in women’s sports, and essentially create Transgender operations for everybody.”
Trump explained that he will meet with Democrat leaders if they “get serious” about America’s future and are more “realistic” about a continuing resolution.
