More than 35,000 employees at the Department of Homeland Security are set to begin receiving paychecks on Friday, the first time in weeks that they will be paid amid the agency’s record-long shutdown. But it could be the last one they get for a while.
The department told employees this week that they would not be paid again until the congressional impasse over funding the agency ends. House Republicans have signaled they do not intend to take up a deal to reopen the department until they see progress on separate legislation to guarantee a funding stream for immigration enforcement for years to come.
“Any additional compensation owed to you will be paid once D.H.S. funding is restored,” said an email sent to homeland security employees on Monday. “We remain hopeful that Congress will fund the department and allow us to reopen soon and get everyone back to work.”
It is the latest sign of the turmoil and confusion rampant at one of the government’s largest departments, which has more than 260,000 employees and includes immigration enforcement agencies, the Federal Emergency Management Agency and the Transportation Security Administration. Much of the department has been operating without congressionally approved funding for nearly two months, leaving thousands of employees working without pay and some basic department functions stalled.
The lump-sum payments expected to hit workers’ bank accounts came after President Trump signed a directive this month calling on his administration to use existing funds to provide them with back pay. The move eased political pressure on lawmakers to end the shutdown, but left workers without clarity about what will happen to their paychecks if the shutdown drags on.
The Homeland Security Department and the White House did not immediately respond to questions about whether the administration planned to take further action to pay workers again in the absence of a deal.
Democrats have said they will not allow money to flow without imposing new restrictions on immigration officers, and House Republicans have refused to act on a bipartisan deal that would unlock funding for everything but immigration enforcement.
In directing his administration to pay all department employees, Mr. Trump was seeking to limit the political fallout of the impasse. White House officials have said the paychecks would be funded by the billions that Republican lawmakers gave the department as part of Mr. Trump’s sweeping domestic policy bill last year, which has already been used to keep carrying out immigration enforcement and paying law enforcement officers during the shutdown. But officials cannot tap those funds indefinitely, and it is unclear how quickly Congress will move.
The uncertainty surrounding pay has frustrated the department’s employees who say they have had to take out loans or deplete their savings to pay for basic necessities.
“There is a feeling of increasing anxiety and uncertainty among officers as the chaos and confusion for workers just trying to get by continues,” Johnny Jones, the secretary-treasurer of the American Federation of Government Employees T.S.A. Council 100 union, said in a statement.
That could reopen concerns about airport security lines. Before Mr. Trump ordered pay for T.S.A. officers last month, many were calling in absent at major airports, snarling security lines and creating a major political headache for politicians on both sides of the aisle.
More than 90 percent of the department’s workers are considered “essential,” meaning that most employees continue to work and the department’s operations do not come to a halt during a shutdown. Still, thousands of department workers remain furloughed at agencies including the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency, which helps protect the country’s election system, power grids and water utilities. Some of the department’s basic functions have also been disrupted by the shutdown, such as certain travel to disaster sites.
Though Republican leaders last week announced an agreement that would allow them to fund most of the department, that effort remains stalled in the House, which will not return from a two-week recess until April 14, two full months after the shutdown began. The Senate has twice passed the deal unanimously, but the House has opted not to do so, as many rank-and-file Republicans object to the plan.
Republican leaders endorsed what they are calling a “two-track” plan for reopening the Homeland Security Department, the first step of which was passing a bill to fund everything but immigration enforcement operations. The second step would be to use a complex budget process known as reconciliation, which is not subject to a filibuster, to blow past Democratic opposition and push a second measure through Congress to fund immigration enforcement until the end of Mr. Trump’s term.
House Republicans, who felt pressured into the first step by the Senate, said during a private conference call last week that they did not want to move forward with the spending bill until the Senate had made demonstrable progress toward the second step to fund immigration enforcement.
Such an effort will be complicated and could take substantial time, but Senate Republican leaders are hoping to bring a measure to the floor by the end of month to start the process.
Madeleine Ngo covers immigration and economic policy for The Times.
The post Homeland Security Workers Get Paid, but the Next Check Is Uncertain appeared first on New York Times.
