Why it matters: If the White House acts on that legal analysis, it would dramatically escalate President Trump’s pressure on Senate Democrats to end the week-old shutdown by denying back pay to as many as 750,000 federal workers after the shutdown.
I’m not sure it would. In the past, federal workers were always paid after the government opened up. If they aren’t paid this time when the GOP holds both the Executive and the Legislative branches, it would be silly to claim the Democrats would have the power to withhold payment.
Why would that stop them from saying so?
It doesn’t stop them saying it. It stops it from being credible. Ever other GOP and Democratic President has always paid, even in trump’s first term during that shutdown. Now suddenly they can’t? If you mess with a worker’s pay you have highly reactive results.
I’ve seen a lot of YouTube videos that have titles like “boss didn’t pay man for two weeks then THIS happened “
It’s normally a video of a dude fucking wrecking the place with a tank made out of a forklift or something.
Marvin Heemeyer?
These people don’t care about credibility.
These people DO care about their paycheck, thats the difference here.
I used to want to work for the federal government and once upon a time it was a very good job. Decent, but not the best, pay along with good health benefits, large amounts (in US terms) of leave, extra holidays, and a pension program. Now I don’t see why anyone would want to work for the federal government. A common sentiment amongst government workers are that you are there for at least one of four things:
1.) Early retirement/pension - In the older days you could potentially fully retire as early as 50.
2.) Healthcare - You got to keep it into early retirement and it was typically better than any private or business insurance or medicare.
3.) Stability - Once in you would probably never be laid off or fired.
4.) Ulterior motives - A lot of government workers do what they do because they get something else out of it. Someone working at the EPA might get a sense of fulfillment and earnestly believe they are making a difference. Likewise someone working in ICE might be getting their failed-military-abuse-of-power rocks off on the bit of power they have over others.
Well the stability is gone, the pension only matters if you have the stability to get to 30 years, and the healthcare is getting worse over time.
They also used to have better-than-normal paid time off but non-govt companies have caught up on that, especially in the tech sector.
And they had a good 401k equivalent (403b) match, but again companies have caught up or surpassed this now.
Some of my old colleagues still work in govt and they have been MISERABLE for the past year and a half (return to office, DOGE/deferred resignations, chronic understaffing, and now this shutdown nonsense).
Does this include ICE agents? That would be pretty funny.
Yup they are currently unpaid. Unsure about bonuses since they make a decent amount in that.
Do we even know if they’re being paid the bonuses that were promised?
But how is the government going to pay for this guy?
More proof that the GOP and all their supporters are enemies of the people of the United States of America.
He’s going to steal backpay for workers he sent home. That’s wage theft, and a good way to get your employees to hate you until the end of time.
If there’s no backpay, think they’ll demand back taxes?
Fuck those guys for letting Congress shut them down. Am I right?
/s
Memos aren’t law. Back pay will be payed eventually.
Agreed. There’s clearly a 90+% chance there will be back pay.
I get that the Trump administration is loathsome, but it’s really disheartening the number of people on here who will throw all logic and reason out the window if it means they can doom-jerk over how evil the administration is.
Once the back pay inevitably happens, everyone who said otherwise on here will just ignore they were wrong, and move on to the next thing that’s obviously false.
To be clear, I’m not defending the Trump administration. It’s been a dumpster fire, and they obviously aren’t above completely violating the law to get their way.
But denying back pay doesn’t make sense on its face. It’s a nonsense position. And the fact that people can’t see that just feels like backwards QAnon to me.
With the unfathomable uncertainty that government employees have faced this year, who can really say what will happen in regards to back pay, RIFs, etc. illegal lines have already been crossed, and I imagine there will be years and years of lawsuits. Personally I still have a sliver of hope that our laws will be upheld one way or another (either by the admin realizing they need to follow the law, or by force of the courts) – despite much evidence to the contrary.
I hope this is just another empty threat they don’t follow through on, even though the memo alone has undoubtedly caused more stress to the government employees. If they try to actually withhold back pay and the courts stop them, then it will at least help give credit to the courts upholding the law. And if the courts allow this to happen… Well, I keep hearing how we are living in unprecedented times, so I also wouldn’t be too surprised at this point.
Don’t tell Trump that.
The year is 5157, and JcbAzpx is finally right about one thing…
Something something UNIONS
