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Good morning. I'm Taylor Wilson, and today is Thursday, October 2nd, 2025.

This is USA Today's The Excert.

Today, the latest is both sides point fingers amid a government shutdown, plus how tariffs could impact races next year, and we remember Jane Goodall.

Amid this week's government shutdown, the finger pointing continued on Capitol Hill yesterday.

And we got some of the White House's perspective.

I got up with USA Today, White House correspondent Francesca Chambers, for the latest.

Thanks for wrapping on, Francesca.

Thanks, Taylor.

So how is Vice President J.D. Vance taking center stage here? Taylor, ever since it became clear that the government was likely to go into a shutdown

because President Trump and congressional leaders couldn't reach a deal at the White House on Monday,

it's been J.D. Vance, who has been taking a very public-facing role in messaging the White House's position on this.

It was the vice president who came out at the White House after that meeting alongside Republican leadership,

House Speaker Mike Johnson, as well as Senate Majority Leader John Thune,

and took questions from reporters at the White House.

And then at the White House again on Wednesday, hours after the government went to a shutdown, the vice president made a surprise

appearance at the White House podium to take questions from reporters then too.

Well, as for President Trump, he said that vast numbers of federal workers could be terminated.

How is he framing this really in the first 24 hours after the shutdown?

Well, he's been saying that for the last several days.

And really, the White House has been warning that for more than a week now with the Office

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