WASHINGTON, Sept 27, (Xinhua): The White House has warned federal agencies to brace themselves for a wave of layoffs if Congress does not come to an agreement to keep the government funded before Oct 1. Congress is approaching a deadline to make a deal to fund the government. If no deal is reached by Sept 30 midnight, parts of the government could shut down until an agreement is reached.

The Office of Management and Budget (OMB) sent out a memo on Wednesday that told agencies whose funding ends on Oct. 1 and those that are "not consistent with the president's priorities" to consider sending out termination notices to employees. The warning is intended to prompt Congress to make a deal and avoid a government shutdown, since the livelihoods of thousands of government workers could be at risk.

During shutdowns in the past, government employees were usually furloughed temporarily until Congress reached a deal on the budget. During the last shutdown, which occurred from late December 2018 to late January 2019 and lasted 35 days, roughly 800,000 federal employees were furloughed or required to work without pay.

The shutdown was primarily due to a dispute over funding for then-President Donald Trump's US-Mexico border wall. "Programs that did not benefit from an infusion of mandatory appropriations will bear the brunt of a shutdown," the OMB wrote in the memo, as reported by Politico, a Washington-based political newspaper. The document is the latest bid to ratchet up the pressure on Democratic lawmakers to cut a deal with GOP members of Congress to avoid a shutdown of some parts of the government.

"We remain hopeful that Democrats in Congress will not trigger a shutdown and the steps outlined above will not be necessary," according to the memo. But the clock is ticking in the lead-up to Tuesday's deadline, when funding for some government departments is slated to run out. So far, Democrats are holding the line on demands that a bill needs to include an extension of enhanced tax credits for the Affordable Care Act -- the healthcare legislation signed into law by former President Barack Obama.

Some analysts believe the White House is not making empty threats, and that the Trump administration is willing to fire federal employees if no deal is reached. "The Trump administration already has fired tens of thousands of employees, so people should take the new threat seriously," Brookings Institution Senior Fellow Darrell West told Xinhua. "Top leaders want to downsize government and see the shutdown as a vehicle to do that.