Trump admin live updates: Gov. says 'no need' after Trump directs troops to Portland

The White House is alerting agencies to prepare for furloughs ahead of a possible government shutdown, but also threatening that mass firings could become permanent if a shutdown is not averted.

"Programs that did not benefit from an infusion of mandatory appropriations will bear the brunt of a shutdown, and we must continue our planning efforts in the event Democrats decide to shut down the government," the White House Office of Management and Budget (OMB) memo sent to federal agencies Wednesday said.

The memo directs agencies to make plans for the usual shutdown furloughs. But it also directs agencies to "use this opportunity to consider Reduction in Force (RIF) notices for all employees" who work in programs with discretionary funding that lapses, don't have other sources of funding or do not align with the president's agenda.

Once the shutdown ends, the OMB said that agencies should "revise" those mass layoffs to "retain the minimal number of employees necessary," meaning many of those job cuts could become permanent.

The cuts that OMB is advising agencies to make go far beyond the typical furloughs that a government shutdown typically causes, upping the stakes for negotiations on Capitol Hill.

The government runs out of funding on Oct. 1. There is not currently a clear path forward to keep the lights on. Democrats have said they won't support a clean stopgap measure to keep the government open unless they can secure health care wins.

It's a different position than ten Senate Democrats, including Minority Leader Chuck Schumer, took in March when they voted to fund the government while warning at the time that a shutdown would give OMB the power to make more sweeping federal cuts.

Secretary of State Marco Rubio met with Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov, one day after President Donald Trump's major shift toward Ukraine.

Trump, after meeting with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy on the sidelines of the United Nations General Assembly on Tuesday, wrote on social media that he thinks Ukraine could win back its seized land. For months, Trump had said he believed Ukraine would have to cede territory in order to bring an end Russia's invasion.

Trump also said that Russia was a "paper tiger," citing its battlefield failures. Russia quickly pushed back, with Kremlin spokesperson Dmitry Peskov saying Russia "is a real bear."

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy addressed the United Nations General Assembly in New York on Wednesday morning, where he called on member nations to stand with Ukraine against Russia.

"International law doesn't work fully unless you have powerful friends who are truly willing to stand up for it," Zelenskyy said. "And even that doesn't work without weapons. It's terrible, but without it, things will be even worse. There are no security guarantees except friends and weapons."

"If it takes pressure on Russia, it must be done and it must be done now otherwise Putin will keep driving the war forward, wider and deeper," Zelenskyy added. "We told you before, Ukraine is only the first and now Russian drones are already flying across Europe, and Russian operations are already spreading across countries ... No one can feel safe right now."

Zelenskyy said he had good meetings with President Trump and other world leaders this week. "Together we can change a lot," he said.

At a U.N. Security Council meeting on Ukraine, Secretary of State Marco Rubio said of Trump’s options for penalizing Russia, there would “come a moment in which we will have to conclude that perhaps there is no interest in a peaceful resolution.”

“And then the president has before him real options, which he intends to pursue, as he has made clear today in some of the messages he has put out,” Rubio said.

The secretary also argued that Trump has shown “extraordinary patience” by not yet levying sanctions against Moscow “in the hopes of having a breakthrough.”

“He's very committed to peace, but his patience is not infinite, and as he has said repeatedly, he has before him the opportunity and the options of imposing additional economic costs on the Russian Federation, if necessary, in order to bring this to an end,” Rubio said. “He also has before him the option, as he has already chosen to do in some circumstances, to sell defensive weaponry and potentially offensive weaponry so that Ukraine can defend itself from this assault by purchasing that weaponry.”

He concluded: “This war needs to end, but if it does not, if there is no path to peace in the short-term, then the United States and President Donald J. Trump will take the steps necessary to impose costs for continued aggression.”

Earlier in his remarks, Rubio also assessed that the war had entered “a period of what appears to be potential even escalation,” citing a historically high number of strikes in recent days as well as incursions by Russian drones and planes into neighboring airspace.

-ABC News’ Shannon Kingston