federal subsidy

Vice President JD Vance said Sunday there will be deeper cuts to the federal workforce the longer the government shutdown goes on, adding to the uncertainty facing hundreds of thousands who are already furloughed without pay amid the stalemate in Congress.

Vance warned that as the federal shutdown entered its 12th day, the new cuts would be “painful,” even as he said the Trump administration worked to ensure that the military is paid this week and some services would be preserved for low-income Americans, including food assistance.

Still, hundreds of thousands of government workers have been furloughed in recent days and, in a court filing Friday, the Office of Management and Budget said well over 4,000 federal employees would soon be fired in conjunction with the shutdown.

“The longer this goes on, the deeper the cuts are going to be,” Vance said on Fox News’ “Sunday Morning Futures.” “To be clear, some of these cuts are going to be painful. This is not a situation that we relish. This is not something that we’re looking forward to, but the Democrats have dealt us a pretty difficult set of cards.”

Labor unions have already filed a lawsuit to stop the aggressive move by President Trump’s budget office, which goes far beyond what usually happens in a government shutdown, further inflaming tensions between the Republicans who control Congress and the Democratic minority.

The shutdown began Oct. 1 after Democrats rejected a short-term funding fix and demanded that the bill include an extension of federal subsidies for health insurance under the Affordable Care Act. The expiration of those subsidies at the end of the year will result in monthly cost increases for millions.

Trump and Republican leaders have said they are open to negotiations on the health subsidies, but insist the government must reopen first.

For now, negotiations are virtually nonexistent. Dug in as ever, House leaders from both parties pointed fingers at each other in rival Sunday appearances on “Fox News Sunday.”

“We have repeatedly made clear that we will sit down with anyone, anytime, anyplace,” said House Democratic leader Hakeem Jeffries of New York. “Republicans control the House, the Senate and the presidency. It’s unfortunate they’ve taken a my-way-or-the-highway approach.”

House Speaker Mike Johnson (R-La.) blamed Democrats and said they “seem not to care” about the pain the shutdown is inflicting.

“They’re trying their best to distract the American people from the simple fact that they’ve chosen a partisan fight so that they can prove to their Marxist rising base in the Democratic Party that they’re willing to fight Trump and Republicans,” he said.

Progressive activists, meanwhile, expressed new support for the Democratic Party’s position in the shutdown fight.

Ezra Levin, co-founder of the leading progressive protest group Indivisible, said he is “feeling good about the strength of Dem position.” He pointed to fractures in the GOP, noting that Georgia Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene publicly warned last week that healthcare insurance premiums would skyrocket for average Americans — including her own adult children — if nothing is done.

“Trump and GOP are rightfully taking the blame for the shutdown and for looming premium increases,” Levin said. “Their chickens are coming home to roost.”

And yet the Republican administration and its congressional allies are showing no signs of compromise on Democratic demands or backing away from threats to use the opportunity to pursue deeper cuts to the federal workforce.

Thousands of employees at the departments of Education, Treasury, Homeland Security and Health and Human Services as well as the Environmental Protection Agency are set to receive layoff notices, according to spokespeople for the agencies and union representatives for federal workers.

“You hear a lot of Senate Democrats say, well, how can Donald Trump possibly lay off all of these federal workers?” Vance said. “Well, the Democrats have given us a choice between giving low-income women their food benefits and paying our troops on the one hand, and, on the other hand, paying federal bureaucrats.”

Democrats say the firings are illegal and unnecessary.

“They do not have to do this,” said Democratic Sen. Mark Kelly of Arizona on CNN’s “State of the Union.” “They do not have to punish people that shouldn’t find themselves in this position.”

Peoples writes for the Associated Press.

Nearly two weeks after Gov. Gavin Newsom launched a special session to fund legal battles against the president-elect, the Democratic leader appeared to be trying to tone down and reframe the California-vs.-Trump narrative he set in motion.

“It’s not a resistance brand,” Newsom said in an interview with The Times. “It’s around pragmatism. It’s about preparedness. We would be fools not to get on top of this before January.”

The subtle shift signals the governor may be revising his role as a liberal champion in the nation’s culture wars in the wake of Donald Trump’s defeat of Vice President Kamala Harris.

But as he set out on a “California jobs first” tour to talk about the economy in the Central Valley, Newsom couldn’t resist the gravitational pull back into the fight over progressive values with Trump.

Despite the state budget crunch, he announced Monday that California will offer rebates for those who purchase zero-emission vehicles if Trump follows through with a threat to end federal subsidies for clean cars. Tesla could be excluded from the state rebates under a plan to restrict the credits to manufacturers with lesser market share, a jab at Trump ally and Newsom critic Elon Musk, Tesla’s owner.

The seesaw underscores Newsom’s challenge as he tries to strike a delicate balance between the political brawler that his Democratic base admires and a more measured national leader capable of winning back disenfranchised voters across the country who backed Trump in the election.

“He’s caught between this old way of being the tip of the spear and just being pure resistance and now considering a presidential run,” said Mike Madrid, a Republican political consultant.

Madrid said Newsom isn’t alone. The governor’s shuffle, in Madrid’s view, personifies a reckoning happening within a Democratic Party focused on identity politics in 2024 without realizing that Trump was winning over voters on economic issues.

“Gavin Newsom has led the Democratic Party into a place where they can win these cultural battles, but that’s not what this election was about,” Madrid said. “The battle is about affordability, and California’s got a huge weakness there.”

The presidential election showcased the Republican strategy of typecasting California and the Democratic Party as left of most of the country. California leaders are preparing to defend against mass deportations, a reversal of LGBTQ+ rights and efforts to weaken climate change policies when Trump takes office.

Embracing electric vehicles is another Democratic litmus test that runs afoul of Trump’s agenda. Newsom has led the way with a mandate to transition all new car sales in California to zero-emission vehicles by 2035. New state subsidies, he argued, seek to protect the electric vehicle market and industry jobs based here.

To his Republican foes in California, the proposed electric vehicle credits are another example of the liberal governor being “out of touch.”

Nationwide only about 3 in 10 Americans would consider buying an electric vehicle, according to a recent study by the Pew Research Center. In the Golden State, electric vehicles account for about 25% of all new car sales — a rise that Newsom touts but which shows most Californians aren’t yet making the switch.

“The reality for most working people is they need their gas-powered vehicle, they can’t afford an electric vehicle, nor do they want one,” said Assembly Republican Leader James Gallagher (R-Yuba City). “When you’re talking about greater tax credits for Hollywood and money for people who want to buy EVs, you’ve missed the memo, bud.”

David McCuan, a professor of political science at Sonoma State University, said subsidies for electric vehicles are a “limousine liberal” issue that wealthy college-educated voters care about, while the working-class voters the party is losing are more worried about the cost of gasoline and the rent.

“Wokeism gives him a platform, but wokeism also exposes his political weaknesses,” McCuan said. “The culture war issues that provide his exposure also are somewhat of an Achilles’ heel for delivering the vote.”

If Newsom has aspirations for the White House, the governor needs to demonstrate more discipline than “knee-jerk” reactions to Trump that draw headlines across the country, and he should craft an inclusive message about the way forward, McCuan said.

“He needs to be front and center in voters’ minds and when they cast their ballot, and that’s the political maturity test that I think he has yet to meet,” McCuan said.

As lawmakers prepare to return to the state Capitol to begin the special session Monday, Newsom and legislative leaders have repeated the message that they’re ready to work with the incoming president. The special session seeks to increase legal funding for the California Department of Justice to protect abortion access, climate change policies, LGBTQ+ rights and disaster funding to make sure California isn’t caught off guard if Trump carries out his agenda as expected, they said.

“It goes without saying if there are opportunities to be able to work together with the new administration that benefit California, of course, we’re all in,” state Senate President Pro Tem Mike McGuire (D-Healdsburg) said. “But let’s be clear, if the president-elect tries to undermine our state, undermine our freedoms or our democracy, he’s going to quickly see how determined the people of California truly are.”

Assembly Speaker Robert Rivas (D-Hollister) said he told his caucus a few days after the election that this isn’t 2016, when legislators introduced a flurry of bills to “Trump-proof” California, because so much of that work is already done. Lawmakers, he said, should focus on helping California residents who stand to lose under the incoming president.

The message voters sent in the election also provides an opportunity for his caucus to advance its priorities around housing affordability and making families feel as though future generations will be able to afford to live here.

“For me as a member of the Assembly and as speaker of the Assembly, I obviously feel a great sense of responsibility because it falls to us to ensure that we’re making progress on these issues, and we just clearly have not convinced residents that we’re doing that,” Rivas said.

Madrid said it’s common for any party to reassess after losing an election. But more tests await Newsom and Democrats on immigration and other issues after Trump is inaugurated.

Their attempts to restrain themselves in the national fight and focus on the cost of living could be out the window by mid-January, he said.

“The chances of the affordability problem being resolved is very minimal because the problem, essentially, is about housing, and that’s not something you solve overnight,” Madrid said. “It’s something that we have neglected for decades and particularly in this administration.”

Staff writer Jaweed Kaleem contributed to this report.