Kevin Hassett, director of the White House National Economic Council, said on Sunday that federal layoffs will take place if President Trump decides that negotiations are going nowhere.
In an interview on CNN’s “State of the Union,” the NEC director signaled Republicans were far from willing to negotiate their position to end the government shutdown but suggested he was hopeful Democrats would compromise this coming week.
“I think that if the president decides that the negotiations are absolutely going nowhere, then there will start to be layoffs,” Hassett said, when asked if the threat of mass federal layoffs during the shutdown will definitely materialize.
“But I think that everybody’s still hopeful that when we get a fresh start at the beginning of the week that we can get the Democrats to see that it’s just common sense to avoid layoffs like that, to avoid the $15 billion a week that the Council of Economic Advisers says will harm GDP if we have a shutdown, and also just all the … rent payments and so on that people won’t be able to make because they’re not getting paid.”
“And so, I think that, we think the Democrats, there’s a chance that they’ll be reasonable once they get back into town on Monday, and if they are, then I think there’s no reason for those layoffs,” he continued.
Trump met with Office of Management and Budget (OMB) Director Russell Vought on Thursday to discuss what Trump described as the “unprecedented opportunity” to consider recommendations for cuts and firings across federal agencies during the shutdown.
“It’s likely going to be in the thousands. It’s a very good question, and that’s something that the Office of Management and Budget and the entire team at the White House here again, is unfortunately having to work on today,” White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt told reporters ahead of the meeting on Thursday.
“These discussions and these conversations, these meetings, would not be happening if the Democrats had voted to keep the government open,” she added.
