Here’s who is getting paid at DHS and who isn’t
By Tami Luhby, CNN
(CNN) — Tens of thousands more Department of Homeland Security workers are now being paid during the record partial government shutdown after President Donald Trump ordered the agency to send Transportation Security Administration employees their back pay.
But tens of thousands of other DHS staffers — including Federal Emergency Management Agency workers, civilians in the US Coast Guard, and Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency employees — are still reporting for work without being compensated.
Nearly 92% of DHS’ 272,000 employees are continuing to work during the shutdown, which began February 14 after Congress failed to fund the agency for the remainder of the fiscal year. There’s no end in sight to the impasse. Lawmakers are on a roughly two-week break for Easter and Passover, after the Senate and House passed conflicting funding bills late last week.
Many of those DHS employees are being paid during the lapse, though the precise number is unclear. CNN has reached out to the agency for more details.
DHS is using money from last summer’s “big, beautiful bill” to continue compensating certain employees — particularly those involved in immigration enforcement, one of Trump’s top priorities.
The department received a $165 billion infusion from the sweeping GOP domestic policy agenda package, which funneled $75 billion to Immigration and Customs Enforcement alone and $64 billion to Customs and Border Protection.
Paychecks for sworn law enforcement officers in ICE, CBP and the Secret Service, as well as for Coast Guard military personnel, are being funded by the “big, beautiful bill,” according to a senior administration official.
Other positions that work on the Trump administration’s immigration enforcement and border security priorities, such as technology specialists and attorneys, are also being paid through the president’s domestic policy package, the official said.
Former DHS Secretary Kristi Noem said last fall that 70,000 law enforcement personnel, including in CBP, ICE and other divisions, would receive their paychecks during the last shutdown thanks to funds from the “big, beautiful bill.”
On Monday, money started flowing into the bank accounts of the roughly 61,000 TSA employees who have missed two full paychecks and one partial paycheck during the shutdown. DHS is likely drawing on a $10 billion pot of funds it received from the “big, beautiful bill,” experts told CNN.
The agency is still working on sending the TSA workers the balance of their pay from the partial check they received in late February, DHS said in a statement Monday. Workers, however, are waiting to hear whether they’ll receive their next paycheck in two weeks, as scheduled.
The American Federation of Government Employees, which represents many DHS staffers, is calling attention to the fact that Trump’s directive did not cover all of the agency’s workers.
“Though TSA officers will be paid, FEMA workers, Coast Guard, CISA, and other DHS employees are waiting on their back pay,” Everett Kelley, AFGE’s national president, said in a statement Saturday. “No check. No relief. No apology as Congress packed their bags and left these American families to struggle alone.”
DHS spokesperson Lauren Bis said the “shutdown is impacting the DHS employees working tirelessly to protect the Homeland during the Word Cup and Freedom 250 celebration,” blaming Democrats for the lack of a funding deal.
Democrats say the impasse now stems from House and Senate Republicans being unable to agree amongst themselves.
This article has been updated with additional information.
The-CNN-Wire
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