Trump issues an order to pay military salaries as the government shutdown continues

US President Donald Trump announced on Saturday that he had issued an order to pay military salaries next week despite the ongoing government closure.

Trump said that he had ordered Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth. "Using all available funds to pay the salaries of our armed forces on October 15"He once again held the Democrats responsible for the funding crisis that has entered its second week.

He wrote on his platform, Truth Social "I will not allow Democrats to take our military and the entire security of our nation hostage with their dangerous government shutdown".

With no end in sight to the government shutdown, Republicans and Democrats are accusing each other of being behind the crisis, and Trump’s message about the military came to intensify the political dispute.

This confrontation led to hundreds of thousands of government employees being placed on temporary leave without pay or they were deemed essential and ordered to work without pay.

/>The closure threatens to not pay salaries to about 1.3 million active-duty military personnel next Wednesday, something that has never happened in any other government closure in the history of the United States.

Trump’s directive to ensure the payment of military salaries came after the White House announced on Friday the start of mass layoffs of federal employees, with the president seeking to intensify pressure on Democrats.

Senate Democratic leader Chuck Schumer accused "Republicans said they would rather see thousands of Americans lose their jobs than sit down and negotiate with Democrats to reopen the government"

Unions representing 800,000 government employees asked a federal judge in San Francisco to issue an emergency order to stop the layoffs, before a hearing scheduled for October 16 on the legality of these operations.

Republicans propose extending the current budget with the same spending levels, while Democrats call for extending health insurance support for low-income families.

Approval of the budget requires several Democratic votes despite the Republican majority in Congress.