Legal experts are holding President Donald Trump’s feet to the fire over his administration’s threat not to back-pay furloughed federal workers after the shutdown ends, noting that the maneuver directly conflicts with a bipartisan federal statute he signed into law in 2019.
Unions and an advocacy group said in a Wednesday letter to the White House Office of Management and Budget that a new legal opinion from the administration amounts to trickery designed to create ambiguity in the law where there is none.
“Given the clarity of the law, there is no place for the Administration to backpedal on its obligation to pay furloughed workers,” said the letter, which was signed by general counsel for unions representing government employees, as well as the founder of the Democracy Defenders Fund. “The Administration’s statements appear to be a naked attempt at inflicting pain on innocent parties to gain advantage in the shutdown.”
In the two days since OMB’s legal opinion backtracking on back pay became public, legal experts have resoundingly condemned the approach as a violation of the Government Employee Fair Treatment Act, which mandates payments for federal workers during a shutdown, even if they are furloughed during the lapse in appropriations.
