J.D. Vance

First of all, I want to assure the American people that the frontline health care workers, the people who monitor measles, Ebola, and other infectious diseases, those people are still on the job.

And we're trying very hard to figure out how to ensure those people get a paycheck, of course, because we want them to be happy and healthy.

We want them to be able to do their jobs well.

But the second point, Margaret, is the government shutdown inevitably leads to some chaos.

We are figuring out how to take money from some areas and give it to other areas.

That chaos is because Schumer and the far left Democrats shut down the government.

We have to remember, Margaret, that the vast majority of Republicans and to their great credit, a number of moderate Democrats have consistently voted to reopen the government.

But if Chuck Schumer and the far left Senate Democrats are going to shut down the government, that is going to lead to some chaos.

So you ask, how does this mistake happen?

It happened because Chuck Schumer shut down the government and we're trying to make sure that essential services still function in the face of that shutdown.

But my point is, Margaret, that we have to do layoffs because we have to preserve necessary resources to do the most critical things that the government does.

And in that phase, you're going to have some chaos.

You're going to lay off people, frankly, Margaret, that the White House doesn't want to lay off.

We would like to reopen the government and ensure these central essential services stayed on.

stay on.

But unfortunately, in an environment where we're dealing with limited resources, where the government is shut down, we've got to move some things around.

And in that moving things around, there is some chaos, there is some unpredictability, but we're trying to do everything that we can with the hand of cards that Chuck Schumer and the Democrats have dealt us.