Reporter questions Karoline Leavitt on layoffs during shutdown

This administration continues to say that they don't want to lay people off, but obviously there is a plan to lay people off. So what is your message to those people who are getting laid off? And then, if the government reopens, will those rifts reverse? Are they not permanent?

If the government reopens specifically, if it reopens pretty quickly? Well sometimes you have to do things you don't want to do, and it's because the Democrats have put us into this position. If the Democrats did not vote to shut down the government, we would not be standing up here talking about layoffs today. We'd be talking about all the other news stories going on in the world and in our country. We'd be talking about all of the great things that this administration is doing to uplift Americans across the country.

But unfortunately, the Vice President of the United States and I have to come out here But unfortunately, the Vice President of the United States and I have to come out here today to talk about a government shutdown that the Democrats put us in this position.