WITH THE END of the US government shutdown in sight, disorganization still reigns at federal agencies. Workers at the Environmental Protection Agency tell WIRED that they have faced increasing chaos over the past five weeks.
In recent weeks, varied phases of furloughs have forced staff to go home in seemingly random waves. Some employees remaining at the agency are working on policies friendly to fossil fuel and industrial interests that are a priority of the administration, even as the rest of the government shuts down.
Others have had to sit on their hands, as the shutdown takes out colleagues with no notice—and remaining employees have little to no information as to what is coming next.
“We learn who is furloughed when we send an email to someone and get the out-of-office message, or we hover over names in Teams for people who are showing out of office,” one EPA worker tells WIRED. (This worker, and others in this story, were granted anonymity because they aren’t permitted to speak to the press.)
Some employees who are being kept are at work revising pollution rules, a core deregulatory goal of the administration. An employee at the Office of Air and Radiation confirmed to WIRED that their team, which is working on rule revisions in that office, is still being called in to work, while others in the office—including support staff like administrative assistants and operations workers—were sent home the week of October 20.
“Staff working in the regulatory part of the air office are still working,” the employee tells WIRED. “Lots of furloughs elsewhere. But we’re still working on deregulatory actions.” The New York Times reported in mid-October that other staffers working to repeal rules friendly to oil, gas, and coal interests were also being told to “press on.”
Around 4,400 employees, WIRED has learned, had been furloughed at the agency as of late October. According to the EPA’s shutdown plan, which was last updated in September, the agency employed more than 15,000 people as of October 1. In the plan, the agency lists just 1,734 employees expected to be retained in the event of a full shutdown. These employees would work on “significant agency activities” deemed crucial enough to be continued in a lapse, including Superfund activities, disaster assistance, criminal investigations, and the preservation of research.
Following a Sunday vote in the Senate, the government shutdown could end as early as this week.
OMB director Russell Vought, the public face of the government shutdown, has tried to use it as a way to further cut back the size of the federal workforce. But more than a month into the shutdown, workers at the EPA have mostly escaped the high-profile reductions in force and mass furloughs that have hit other agencies. Many workers are still coming in to do their jobs as the agency tries to continue business as usual. EPA administrator Lee Zeldin, meanwhile, has squarely blamed Democrats.