US government shutdown: White House reviewing aid that can potentially be cut in Portland, says press secretary – live | Trump administration
White House halts $2.1bn of Chicago infrastructure funding
The federal government put $2.1bn earmarked for Chicago infrastructure projects on hold, office and management and budget director Russ Vought said on Friday, in another jab at a Democrat-led city during the US government shutdown.
Vought wrote on X that projects affected included the Red Line extension – which was set to break ground next year and extend public transport to underserved areas in the city – as well as modernization work to a number of transit lines.
Vought wrote on social media Friday that the money was “put on hold to ensure funding is not flowing via race-based contracting”.
He made a similar announcement earlier this week involving New York, where Vought said $18m for infrastructure would be paused, including funding for a new rail tunnel under the Hudson River.
Key events
Leavitt declines to comment on Bad Bunny being chosen to do the Superbowl halftime show and says “there’s no tangible plan in store … right now” for Ice agents to be there.
Asked if Project 2025 – which Trump distanced himself from during his election campaign but evoked yesterday – is the blueprint for shrinking the government, Leavitt says the blueprint is what the president and his team identify.
Asked if the “thousands” of layoffs would still be on the table if the government shutdown came to an end and funding was restored, Leavitt gives a vague answer about cuts and layoffs being “an unfortunate consequence” of the shutdown.
Leavitt is asked what constitutes being a “Democrat agency” (using the language used by Trump in his social media post yesterday announcing that cuts such agencies were coming).
Leavitt says the administration has been clear about agencies and programs that do not align with its values “of putting our country first”. She cites cuts to USAID to illustrate this.
Trump to review federal aid that can be cut from Portland
Donald Trump has directed his team at the White House to begin reviewing aid that can potentially be cut in Portland, Oregon, Leavitt says.
“We will not fund states that allow anarchy,” Leavitt says. “There will also be an additional surge of federal resources to Portland immediately.”
Most Americans – including over half of Republicans – back extending enhanced Obamacare subsidies, poll finds
Almost 8 in 10 Americans say they want Congress to extend enhanced Affordable Care Act premium subsidies, according to a poll published today by KFF, a nonpartisan health policy research group.
About 78% of adults said the subsidies, which lower premiums for people buying coverage on ACA marketplaces, should be extended, compared with 22% who favor letting them lapse.
Support cuts across party lines, with 92% of Democrats, 82% of independents and 59% of Republicans – including 57% of those aligned with Donald Trump’s MAGA movement – backing an extension.
If Congress does not act, health insurance costs would increase sharply for many of the 24 million Americans who get their coverage through the ACA, according to KFF.
The impact would be most acute in Republican-controlled states that have not expanded the Medicaid health plan for the poor.
Democrats also want guardrails that would stop Donald Trump from unilaterally ignoring their ACA provisions or temporarily withholding funds.
“The poll was fielded just prior to the Oct. 1 federal government shutdown that was triggered in part by disagreements about whether, how and when to extend the expiring tax credits,” said the KFF.
Without action, premiums for subsidized enrollees could more than double next year, rising 114% on average to $1,904, according to the group.
White House press briefing
Leavitt has arrived. She starts off blaming Democrats for the shutdown and repeating the same false claims about healthcare and undocumented immigrants.
Hegseth says US has carried out strike against alleged drug vessel off Venezuelan coast
Trump’s secretary of war (formerly of defense) Pete Hegseth has said the US has carried out a strike on an (alleged) “narco-trafficking” vessel in international waters off the coast of Venezuela, the fourth such attack in recent weeks.
Four men aboard the vessel were killed, Hegseth said in a post on X. “These strikes will continue until the attacks on the American people are over!!!!” he added.
In his post he included an “unclassified” clip that shows a strike on a boat. He didn’t say in his post where the boat had originated from.
Earlier this morning, on President Trump’s orders, I directed a lethal, kinetic strike on a narco-trafficking vessel affiliated with Designated Terrorist Organizations in the USSOUTHCOM area of responsibility. Four male narco-terrorists aboard the vessel were killed in the… pic.twitter.com/QpNPljFcGn
— Secretary of War Pete Hegseth (@SecWar) October 3, 2025
Yesterday, in an attempt to justify strikes on alleged Venezuelan drug boats, Donald Trump declared that drug cartels operating in the Caribbean are unlawful combatants and said the US was now in a “non-international armed conflict”.
The US military last month carried out three deadly strikes against alleged drug smuggling boats in the Caribbean, killing 17 people and triggering international outrage. At least two of those operations were carried out on vessels that originated from Venezuela.
White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt is due to brief reporters in about 20 minutes on day three of the government shutdown. I’ll bring you all the key news lines from that once it gets going.
Trump administration reverses $187m cut to New York’s security funds
“The White House will restore $187m in cuts to law enforcement funding that would have devastated New York’s intelligence and counterterrorism operations, following a bipartisan effort to reinstate the funds,” the New York Times (paywall) reports.
The state’s Democratic governor Kathy Hochul, as well as several of the state’s Republican House members, had been pushing for the cuts to be reversed since the Department for Homeland Security made the announcement – without giving any reasoning – last Friday.
In a post on X this morning, the governor said: “From the moment @Sec_Noem tried to defund our police and counterterrorism programs, we stood up and fought back. I’m glad that @POTUS heard our call to reverse these cuts. That means $187 million for the NYPD, FDNY & first responders across the state that keep New Yorkers safe.”
According to the NYT’s report: “The cuts, which represented the largest federal defunding of police operations in New York in decades, were made by the Department of Homeland Security, without the approval of President Trump, White House officials said. Mr. Trump was first told of the cuts by Ms. Hochul during a phone call on Sunday evening, according to three people with knowledge of the conversation.”
Hochul had slammed the cuts as “utterly shocking” and accused homeland security secretary Kristi Noem of making “all of America more vulnerable to terrorist attacks”.
Senate to vote on short-term spending measures again
The Senate has reconvened on day three of the government shutdown, and is expected to again take up spending bill proposals from Democrats and Republicans that have already failed three times in the last few weeks.
There hasn’t been much to suggest a huge deal of movement from either side, but we’ll be watching to see if any more Democrats cross party lines to vote with Republicans to move forward with the clean stopgap funding bill that the House has passed.
If the votes fail again the Senate isn’t expected to vote again over the weekend, meaning the shutdown would last for at least six days. We’ll bring you the latest on the votes when they come.
A federal judge in Louisiana ruled on Thursday that former US president Joe Biden “exceeded his authority” by withdrawing large areas along US coastlines from future offshore oil and gas development, Reuters reports.
Before leaving office, Biden banned new offshore oil and gas drilling along coastlines. It was met with a lawsuit by the state of Louisiana.
The Supreme Court has agreed to hear another major gun rights case.
The justices announced that they are adding the Wolford v. Lopez case to their docket for this term.
The case centers around a Hawaii law that bans people from carrying guns in various public spaces that serve alcohol. It also bans people from carrying guns in commercial establishments without permission of the property owner.
Senate Majority Leader John Thune said that any further cuts to the federal government by the Trump administration is the Democrats’ fault.
“You’re also handing the administration an opportunity to do things that probably, in most cases, you’re not going to agree with,” Thune said about Democrats.
“The effects are very serious on real people, real Americans,” Speaker Mike Johnson said, when asked about previous comments saying that “people are having fun with this,” in regards to federal government slashing and potential layoffs.
“We support federal employees who do a great job in all these different areas, but what they’re trying to have fun with, trying to make light of, is to point out the absurdity of the Democrats’ position, and they’re using memes and all the tools of social media to do that,” Johnson said.
“Some people find that entertaining, but at the end of the day, the decisions are hard ones and I’m telling you, they’re not taking any pleasure in that.”
