Federal Layoff Risk Shifts to Monday as Unions Seek Court Order
Source: Bloomberg
October 5, 2025 at 9:23 AM EDT
Updated on October 5, 2025 at 11:11 AM EDT
Unions representing hundreds of thousands of federal workers asked a US judge to immediately block any mass firings by the Trump administration during the government shutdown while they press a legal challenge. The emergency request Saturday night to US District Judge Vince Chhabria in San Francisco follows what the unions contend are a series of statements from President Donald Trump and other senior officials signaling that agencies could take action on layoff plans as early as Monday.
Kevin Hassett, Trump’s top economic adviser in the White House, said the administration is holding off on layoffs at least until Monday, when a divided Senate is due to vote for the fifth time on a stopgap bill to keep government open through Nov. 21. Without Democratic defections, the vote is likely to fail.
“I think that if the president decides that the negotiations are absolutely going nowhere that there will start to be layoffs,” Hassett said Sunday on CNN’s State of the Union. “We think the Democrats, there’s a chance that they’ll be reasonable. Let’s get back into town on Monday, and if they are then I think there’s no reason for those layoffs.”
US government operations have been largely halted since Oct. 1 as budget talks between Democrats and Republicans remain at an impasse over a spending measure that would resume normal operations. The unions that brought the lawsuit are seeking a temporary order barring agencies from conducting layoffs related to programs, projects or other activities that their members are part of while they argue for longer-term court intervention.
Read more: https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2025-10-05/federal-worker-unions-ask-to-preemptively-block-shutdown-layoffs
Link to FILING (PDF) - https://assets.bwbx.io/documents/users/iqjWHBFdfxIU/rBzKzrdVMEjA/v0