Updates: US government shutdown starts as Trump threatens mass layoffs

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• A United States federal government shutdown started at midnight local time on Wednesday (04:00 GMT).
• The shutdown will temporarily halt some government services and put the salaries of hundreds of thousands of government employees on hold.
• President Donald Trump has threatened to use the funding lapse to implement mass layoffs of government workers, and his government has already frozen about $26bn in funding to Democrat-led states.
• The shutdown comes after Congress failed to reach an agreement on a spending bill, with Democrats pushing for continued funding for the Affordable Care Act, also known as Obamacare, and the removal of cuts to Medicaid.