WASHINGTON — President Donald Trump has repurposed money to fund military salaries during the government shutdown. He has pledged to find ways to make sure many in law enforcement get paid. He has used the fiscal impasse to halt funding to Democratic jurisdictions and is trying to lay off thousands of federal workers.

Government shutdowns are usually resolved only after the pain they inflict on everyday Americans forces elected officials in Washington to come to an agreement. But as the shutdown nears a fourth week, Trump’s actions have instead reduced the pressure for an immediate resolution and pushed his political opponents to further dig in.

“We’re not going to bend,” Rep. Hakeem Jeffries, D-N.Y., the minority leader, said Friday, the 17th day of the shutdown. “We’re not going to break. All of these efforts to try to intimidate Democratic members of the House and the Senate are not going to work.”

Unlike past presidents, Trump appears to feel little urgency to strike a deal to reopen the government. Instead, he has used the shutdown, which began Oct. 1, as an opportunity to further remake the federal bureaucracy and jettison programs he does not like, seizing on unorthodox budgetary maneuvers that some have called illegal.

Administration officials appear undaunted by the criticism, even after a federal judge temporarily blocked their efforts to conduct mass firings. Friday, some agencies indicated in court filings that they might proceed with layoffs that officials suggested were not covered by the order.

Russell Vought, the director of the Office of Management and Budget and the architect of the effort to remake the government, has pledged to “stay on offense” throughout the shutdown.

“He now has this cover for doing what at least Russ Vought and that coalition has wanted to do all along,” Sarah Binder, a political science professor at George Washington University, said of Trump.

The standoff in Congress hinges on a fight over a short-term funding measure. Republicans want to pass one at current budget levels, while Democrats want to include additional money for health care programs and language that would limit Trump’s power to freeze funding.

Asked in the Oval Office this past week whether he would use his dealmaking skills to bring the shutdown to an end, Trump said that he was instead working to lower health care costs without the help of Congress, by negotiating agreements directly with pharmaceutical companies for lower prescription costs.

“We have to take care of our health care,” he said.

White House officials say that the administration’s moves are meant to send the message that it is Trump, not congressional Democrats, who is helping Americans when government funding has lapsed.

“Any negative impacts felt by the American people have purely been caused by the Democrats,” said Abigail Jackson, a White House spokesperson.

The administration has mitigated some of the fallout by using budgetary maneuvers to keep salaries flowing to some federal workers, including border agents and law enforcement officers, as well as members of the military. Trump has also pledged to use tariff money to fund a food aid program for low-income Americans.