Federal agencies are just eight days away from seeing their funding lapse and having to shutter their offices, though which employees will be sent home remains unknown.
Typically, agencies publicly post their “contingency plans” in advance of a potential shutdown that detail which workers would be furloughed and which would remain on the job. Large swaths of the federal workforce are exempted from shutdown furloughs due either to the nature of their jobs or because they are funded through means other than annual appropriations. Under existing guidance from the Office of Management and Budget dating back to the Obama administration, agencies are expected to update their plans at least every two years.
While not every agency complied with that mandate historically, the most recently updated plans were always made publicly available on OMB’s website. Earlier this year, OMB took down those plans. It has not yet restored them and OMB did not respond to multiple inquiries into their status.
A Government Executive analysis of the most recently available data showed the Biden administration planned to furlough about 737,000 employees if a shutdown occurred in 2023, or about one-third of the workforce. Typically, departments such as Veterans Affairs, Homeland Security and Justice send home very few employees because most of their workers are deemed necessary to protect life or property. The Education Department, NASA and Environmental Protection Agency, meanwhile, have furloughed the vast majorities of their workforces.
Different administrations have taken varying approaches in determining who gets furloughed and who works. The first Trump administration took an unusually aggressive approach to keeping staff at work.
Accusing its predecessors of “weaponizing” shutdowns, Trump’s OMB instructed agencies to identify “carry-forward funding” and “transfer authority” to minimize the impact of shutdowns. That led to several agencies that in prior appropriations lapses sent home the vast majority of its workforce instead furloughing very few employees, though in some cases agencies were forced to increase the number of employees it furloughed as the shutdown dragged on.
The Government Accountability Office, which enforces the Anti-Deficiency Act, the law that governs federal spending during shutdowns, ultimately found the Trump administration acted unlawfully during the 2018-2019 funding lapse. Trump has repeatedly clashed with GAO over spending laws, with the watchdog finding several instances this year in which his administration illegally impounded federal funds.
The House last week approved a stopgap spending bill through Nov. 21 in a largely party-line vote. The measure requires bipartisan support in the Senate, however, and Democrats have so far declined to provide it. The party is holding out for an agreement to reverse scheduled increases to health care premiums for those receiving coverage under the Affordable Care Act, among other demands.
White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt on Monday suggested a shutdown would lead to significant impacts in government operations.
“It will only hurt the most vulnerable in our country: our seniors, our veterans, our military families,” Leavitt said.
Under a measure President Trump signed into law to end the 2019 shutdown, all federal employees—both those who work during and those who are furloughed—are guaranteed backpay when the shutdown ends.
