By Stacy M. Brown, NNPA Newswire Senior National Correspondent
Federal employees across the country received an unsettling email Monday morning—a directive from the Trump administration’s Office of Personnel Management (OPM) outlining a so-called “deferred resignation program” that offers workers guaranteed pay and benefits until September 30, 2025—months beyond the government’s current funding deadline. Legal experts, state attorneys general, and labor organizations are warning that the administration’s move is not only legally dubious but outright illegal. It violates the Anti-Deficiency Act, which bars the government from spending money that Congress has not authorized.
GOP Officials Acknowledge Buyout Program Is Illegal
While congressional Republicans have remained largely silent, GOP officials privately admit that the Trump administration’s offer to pay federal employees beyond the government’s mid-March funding deadline violates federal law. “This is an outright violation of federal law,” one Republican official told CBS News. “Anybody else would be walked out of an agency for going $1 beyond appropriated dollars. The back-of-the-napkin math on this offer—paying all federal employees for 6.5 months beyond current appropriations—comes out to about $50 billion. Even if only a fraction accepts, the obligation is still incurred.” Despite these warnings, few expect congressional Republicans to challenge the administration’s move, leaving the program’s legality in limbo.
State Attorneys General Warn Federal Employees to Avoid the Scheme
Maryland Attorney General Anthony Brown joined 11 other states in cautioning federal employees against the Trump administration’s proposal, calling it an attack on the government’s ability to serve the public. “The terms of this vague, so-called ‘deferred resignation’ put federal employees in an ambiguous position and risk straining essential government resources that people across the state and country rely on to live full, healthy lives,” Brown said in a statement Monday. Unions representing federal workers have also condemned the move, warning that it is nothing more than an attempt to dismantle the civil service under the guise of cost-cutting.
“The number of civil servants hasn’t meaningfully changed since 1970, but more Americans than ever rely on government services,” the American Federation of Government Employees (AFGE) said. “Purging the federal government of dedicated career civil servants will have vast, unintended consequences that will cause chaos for the Americans who depend on a functioning federal government.”
The Deferred Resignation Offer: A Legal and Logistical Mess
The latest email from OPM, titled “Fork in the Road”, is the third communication sent to federal employees regarding the resignation plan. The message, according to CBS News, reads:
Q: The current funding bill for the federal government expires on March 14. Will I still receive full pay and benefits if the money runs out?
A: Any government shutdown could potentially affect an employee’s pay regardless of whether he or she has accepted the deferred resignation offer. Moreover, if you accept the deferred resignation offer, you would still be entitled to backpay under the Government Employee Fair Treatment Act.
Legal experts have pointed out that the Administrative Leave Act only allows agencies to place employees on 10 workdays of paid leave in a calendar year—nowhere near the eight months of paid leave that OPM is now offering under the Trump administration’s directive.
“This email is another ill-motivated effort to get as many federal employees to quit as soon as possible,” said Peter Jenkins, senior counsel for Public Employees for Environmental Responsibility (PEER). “OPM has no legal authority to reliably claim that the Trump administration will put everyone who quits in the next eight days on paid administrative leave throughout the next eight months.”
According to PEER’s analysis, OPM’s website explicitly states that the maximum incentive for voluntary resignations is capped at $25,000—a stark contrast to the months-long compensation the administration promises.
Further, PEER’s executive director, Tim Whitehouse, said federal employees should be extremely skeptical of the buyout offer.
“The country needs a strong civil service to help address these threats, something this administration seems determined to destroy,” Whitehouse told NPR. “Federal employees should be very skeptical about accepting this offer.”
History Shows Buyouts Lead to Higher Costs and Workforce Instability
Buyouts and workforce reductions have been tried before, with disastrous consequences. A Government Accountability Office (GAO) report on similar buyouts during the Clinton administration in the 1990s found that many agencies granted buyouts without a clear strategy, leading to a loss of institutional knowledge and forcing the government to hire back many of the same employees as higher-paid consultants. Experts warn that this time’s effects could be even worse, particularly given the Trump administration’s efforts to sideline federal employees working in diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) and environmental justice roles.
“In a cruel twist, the administration has arbitrarily sidelined employees across the government who work on diversity, equity, inclusion, and environmental justice issues,” PEER reported. These employees, who were already placed on administrative leave and denied access to their emails, cannot even respond to this offer. Despite the administration’s claims that the buyout will save money, economists say it is unlikely to deliver the promised results.
“The government spends about $350 billion a year on federal employees—just 5% of the total budget—yet this administration is determined to gut the civil service as if it’s some bloated bureaucracy,” said Josh Bivens, chief economist at the Economic Policy Institute, in an interview with CBS News.
Widespread Fallout Looms as Buyout Deadline Nears
With the February 6 deadline fast approaching, federal workers nationwide are being forced to decide whether to accept an offer that could leave them without legal recourse if the administration fails to follow through on its promises. Meanwhile, Congressional Republicans remain silent, despite growing concerns from legal experts, state officials, and workers. According to Max Stier, president and CEO of the Partnership for Public Service, many of these federal workers are veterans and professionals who have dedicated their lives to serving the country.
“Most people don’t understand that lots of people in the military go into civil service because they want to continue to serve,” Stier told NPR.
