A senior official at the Office of Management and Budget (OMB) in 2019 said the Government Employee Fair Treatment Act (GEFTA) "does not create an entitlement for furloughed employees," bolstering the White House's view that furloughed workers are not guaranteed back pay during a government shutdown, reports Axios.
An estimated 750,000 federal employees have been furloughed or forced to work without pay since the shutdown began on Oct. 1.
President Donald Trump on Tuesday said some of those workers "don't deserve to be taken care of, and we'll take care of them in a different way."
A memo circulated by the White House earlier this week said furloughed workers aren't guaranteed compensation for their forced time off during the shutdown.
That memo from the OMB argues that GEFTA has been misconstrued.
"Does this law cover all these furloughed employees automatically? The conventional wisdom is: Yes, it does. Our view is: No, it doesn't," a senior White House official told Axios.
That stance hinges on GEFTA's amended version, which clarified that any back pay must be "subject to the enactment of appropriations acts," which is the technical phrase for a shutdown. In plain terms, Congress must pass additional legislation after a shutdown to actually release the money for back pay.
According to internal OMB emails obtained by Axios, one day before Trump signed GEFTA into law on Jan. 15, 2019, a Senate staffer wrote to OMB with questions about the "ambiguous" legislation (shortened to S.24) that needed to be "clearer" because it "appears to create a permanent entitlement" for furloughed workers but included other language that conflicted with that.
"S. 24 does not create an entitlement for furloughed employees," a senior OMB official emailed back at 5:07 p.m. on Jan. 17, 2019, per the Axios report.
"It's preferable if S. 24 were further clarified to make it more explicit that payment to furloughed employees is contingent on future appropriations and eliminate any confusion about the relationship between the newly enacted statute and future appropriations bill[s]," the email continued, foreshadowing OMB's current position.
Labor unions and Democrats are furious, accusing Trump's OMB of twisting the law's intent to punish workers and gain leverage during the shutdown.
"If OMB chooses thuggish intimidation tactics over following the law, it better prepare to face the American people in court," Sen. Tim Kaine, D-Va., told Axios.
Virginia has one of the largest numbers of federal workers.
"The law is simply not on the side of Trump's threats to withhold pay from federal employees that he somehow disfavors," Rep. Jamie Raskin, D-Md., told Axios in a phone interview.
A senior White House official told the news outlet the administration isn't backing down from OMB's interpretation.
"This view was explored, discussed, and supported in the first term, and we're continuing to explore, discuss and support that view now," the person told Axios.
Solange Reyner ✉
Solange Reyner is a writer and editor for Newsmax. She has more than 15 years in the journalism industry reporting and covering news, sports and politics.
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