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Unions ask judge to block immediate firings of federal workers, which White House said could begin Monday

By Neal Augenstein

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A federal judge in San Francisco could rule Monday on an emergency request from unions representing government employees, seeking to block immediate layoffs threatened by the White House amid a government shutdown. 

The White House senior economic adviser Kevin Hassett told CNN’s “State of the Union” Sunday that layoffs could begin as early as Monday, “if the president decides that the negotiations are absolutely going nowhere.”

Saturday, unions representing federal workers filed a motion for a temporary restraining order, asking Judge Vince Chhabria of the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of California to block President Donald Trump’s administration from taking immediate action.

Last week, the court received a lawsuit filed by the American Federation of Government Employees and the American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees.

The temporary restraining order request follows the AFGE and AFSCME suit.

The unions’ lawsuit focuses on a memo the White House budget office sent to agency leaders in late September to prepare for large-scale firings if the federal government shut down.

The memo from OMB said agencies should consider a reduction in force for federal programs whose funding would lapse next week, are not otherwise funded and are “not consistent with the President’s priorities.”

President Donald Trump has said on social media that he and budget director Russell Vought would determine “which of the many Democrat Agencies” would be cut.

The unions argue the White House doesn’t have the legal authority to permanently shed workers during a lapse in appropriations, and that after the shutdown, furloughed employees who worked without paychecks would receive back pay.

As of Monday morning, Chhabria’s docket doesn’t reflect that the case has been scheduled for argument Monday.

Trump overturned decades of US trade policy in 2025. See the impact of his tariffs, in four charts

By The Associated Press
Since returning to the White House in January, President Donald Trump has overturned decades of U.S. trade policy — building a wall of tariffs around what used to be a wide open economy. His double-digit taxes on imports from almost every country have disrupted global commerce and strained the budgets of consumers and businesses worldwide. They have also raised tens of billions of dollars for the U.S. Treasury. Trump has argued that his steep new import taxes are necessary to bring back wealth that was “stolen” from the U.S. He says they will narrow America's decades-old trade deficit and bring manufacturing back to the country. But upending the global supply chain has proven costly for households facing rising prices. The taxes are paid by importers who typically attempt to pass along the higher costs to their customers. That includes businesses and ultimately, U.S. households. And the erratic way the president rolled out his tariffs — announcing them, then suspending or altering them before conjuring up new ones — made 2025 one of the most turbulent economic years in recent memory.
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