Trump administration offers FERC staff eight months paid leave to resign

The Trump administration has offered full salaries and benefits for Federal Energy Regulatory Commission staff for eight months if they agree to resign by Feb. 6, the Office of Personnel Management has said.

All federal employees who agree to resign by Feb. 6 will be placed on administrative leave with full pay until Sept. 30, the Jan. 28 memo said. These employees will have their duties "re-assigned or eliminated," unless an agency head determines it necessary for an employee "to be actively engaged in transitioning job duties," OPM said.

The program is part of President Donald Trump's plan to shrink the size of the federal workforce and rein in government spending. In a flurry of executive orders during his first week in office, the president froze federal hiring and directed agencies to make plans to reduce headcounts.

The Trump administration estimated 5%-10% of the federal workforce would take the offer, which the administration said may translate to $100 billion in lower costs.

FERC impacts

The action raised questions in some quarters Jan. 29 about whether FERC could risk losing staff needed to review energy infrastructure, including gas projects that are a priority for the Trump administration.

"If we have a significant reduction in force, without other improvements in the process or other changes that make the [permitting] process work, then all this is doing is adding delay," said Rob Gramlich, president of consulting firm Grid Strategies.

Natural gas pipeline developers anticipate there will be an upswing in project applications at FERC, given the support from the administration for expansion of midstream capacity. Processing the applications will require adequate staffing at the agency.

During Trump's first term, FERC took extra steps to attract technically skilled personnel, who are highly sought after in the job market, in order to help process a boom in LNG project development along the US Gulf Coast.

Compared with other offices within FERC, the limited engineering staff that review and authorize work for LNG projects is small and specialized, meaning the loss of one or two staffers could be critical and lead to project delays, said an industry source who asked not to be named.

Large-scale projects often require regulatory signoffs across multiple agencies.

The White House's offer largely came as a result of Trump's Jan. 20 executive order which directed agency heads to "take all necessary steps to terminate remote work arrangements and require employees to return to work in-person at their respective duty stations on a full-time basis."

The degree to which staff return to the office full time or accept resignation offers may depend on whether people have rearranged their lives during the pandemic and face longer commutes.

"There's a balance to be struck between having the necessary staff to process permits, particularly for complex projects for LNG terminals, and also reducing staff pursuant to the administration's broader goals," said Tom Sharp, director of permitting intelligence at the consulting firm Arbo.

A FERC spokesperson did not immediately reply to a request for comment.

Time will tell what the impact will be on agencies, Travis Fisher, a former FERC employee now Cato Institute director of energy and environmental policy studies, said. "For each person who resigns because they want no part of the Trump administration's agenda, it's likely there is a knowledgeable public servant who will be driven away by the prospect of uncertain employment."

The OPM offer applies to all federal employees except for military personnel, US Postal Service workers and positions relating to immigration enforcement and national security.

Legal questions

The offer is facing scrutiny from some lawmakers and worker advocates.

The offer could run in conflict to an OPM rule finalized under the Biden administration that states a federal employee cannot be on administrative leave for more than 10 days per calendar year, significantly below the eight months promised in the memo.

The Trump administration's strategy mimics one used by the president's confidant and Tesla CEO Elon Musk when he took over Twitter, now X in 2022.

Trump tapped Musk to lead a new entity dubbed the Department of Government Efficiency designed to reduce government spending. Musk offered a similar deal to Twitter employees after taking over the company.

However, Musk has faced several lawsuits that alleged employees were not paid their full severance packages.

"The eight-month severance offer through the end of the government fiscal year is the most that is legally allowed without Congress passing another appropriations bill," Musk said in a Jan. 29 statement to X. "Very generous."

Senator Tim Kaine, Democrat-Virginia, said he doubted Trump had the legal authority to issue the offer and urged federal employees not to accept it.

"The President has no authority to make that offer," Kaine said on the Senate floor Jan. 28. " There's no budget line item to pay people who don't show up to work. If you accept that offer and resign, he will stiff you."