ANNAPOLIS—Gov. Wes Moore on Wednesday blamed President Donald Trump for a federal shutdown that he says is landing especially hard on the Maryland workforce.
“Since Donald Trump has come on board, he has fired over 15,000 Marylanders that are federal workers,” Moore said in a press conference. “Donald Trump doesn’t have an interest in governing. He doesn’t have an interest in a fully functioning relationship between the federal government and the states.”
But state Republicans say Democrats bear responsibility for the fact that many Marylanders will be missing their paychecks until Congress can approve a continuing resolution that would keep the government running.
State Sen. Justin Ready, the minority whip, blamed Democrats in Washington and elsewhere for the shutdown.
“Maryland Democrats must abandon the political theater and focus on governing. They need to prioritize Maryland families first by putting D.C. grandstanding aside by supporting a clean CR to reopen the federal government,” he said in a statement.
Trump has threatened mass government layoffs if congressional Democrats refuse to get on board for a Republican spending bill. And that means something in Maryland, where a huge chunk of the workforce is employed directly by the federal government, or is a contractor for one of its agencies.
In 2024, prior to job cuts under the Trump administration, an estimated 269,000 Maryland residents were employed by the federal government, state officials told reporters on Wednesday. They said about 210,000 were federal contractors.
Moore said that 15,000 jobs have already been cut in the past year. Now, those who are still on the payroll will go without paychecks, and those who are nonessential will be furloughed.
State officials can’t do much to help those employees absorb the impact, but Moore vowed to do all he could to provide some support.
His administration plans to keep paying out for safety net programs, assuming they’ll get their federal reimbursement as usual. They haven’t heard otherwise, state officials told reporters Wednesday.
The governor is asking the courts and utility companies to protect furloughed federal workers from eviction, foreclosure, or utility shutoffs while they are involuntarily suspended from work. He’s also expanding emergency assistance programs for federal employees.
But the state will not be able to support these programs indefinitely, Moore said. If the shutdown continues, the state and its residents face worsening consequences.
“We can see big infrastructure projects delayed,” he said. “We can see military families, people who already sacrificed for this country, go without pay for weeks. We can see small businesses dip into the red.”
Moore said that his administration will monitor and respond to growing uncertainty caused by the shutdown.
“We are going to do everything in our power,” Moore said, “to make sure that, despite the federal government deciding to leave all of us on our own, that people in the state of Maryland will know that the state, at least, and this administration will continue to fight for them.”