‘Congress members get paid, janitors don’t’ in US shutdown: Fact check

Many national authorities employees volition forgo paychecks aft the United States government unopen down. But that won’t beryllium the lawsuit for lawmakers, a wide podcaster said.

“If the authorities shuts down, members of Congress inactive get paid,” said Dan Koh, big of The People’s Cabinet podcast successful a clip helium posted connected September 29 connected X. “The janitors ne'er get paid.”

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Koh, who worked arsenic lawman adjunct to erstwhile President Joe Biden, said successful the clip that astir each janitors who enactment connected national spot are employed by backstage contractors.

“There is nary obligation, and Donald Trump, I warrant you, has nary volition of paying these janitors if the authorities shuts down,” Koh said. “So they get wholly screwed. There is nary backmost pay. They conscionable get nary money.”

Democrats and Republicans are successful a battle over whether to widen expiring subsidies for the Affordable Care Act and reverse Medicaid cuts successful must-pass legislation, starring to the existent US authorities shutdown.

Who gets paid and who doesn’t erstwhile the authorities shuts down?

Congress receives its pay

Congress does get paid during a shutdown. Lawmakers person repeatedly proposed bills that would halt that practice, but those measures person not go law.

Members of Congress are not taxable to furlough due to the fact that of their law responsibilities. Article I, Section 6 of the Constitution says, “Senators and Representatives shall person a Compensation for their Services, to beryllium ascertained by Law, and paid retired of the Treasury of the United States.” Member salaries person been provided by a permanent, mandatory appropriation for decades.

Most representatives and senators are paid $174,000 a year. The lone exceptions see the House speaker, who receives $223,500 annually, and the Senate president pro tempore, arsenic good arsenic the bulk and number leaders successful the House and Senate, who are each paid $193,400 a year.

Contractors are not guaranteed pay

Employees are not paid during a shutdown, including those who are deemed indispensable and indispensable study to work. These see galore migration enforcement workers and Transportation Security Administration agents astatine airports.

A 2019 national instrumentality says employees furloughed arsenic a effect of a lapse successful appropriations, arsenic good arsenic those required to enactment without pay, person backmost pay. But the instrumentality makes nary notation of contractors.

What astir Koh’s assertion that janitors “never” get paid amid a shutdown? We recovered nary definitive accusation connected janitors employed by contractors, but labour and employment lawyers and national fund experts said contractors are often not paid.

Jim Malatras, main strategy serviceman astatine The Fedcap Group, a nonprofit that has national janitorial and custodial contracts that employment radical with disabilities, told PolitiFact that the institution volition proceed to wage its employees if there’s a authorities shutdown “while we person the backing to bash so”.

Charlotte Hoffman, spokesperson for US Senator Tina Smith, said not each contracted worker automatically gets furloughed without pay. It’s up to each national bureau to halt its contracts; astir are stopped. Contracting companies tin take whether to proceed to wage their employees. Most janitors are contracted and look furloughs, but that concern whitethorn not use to each idiosyncratic who works connected a national contract, Hoffman said.

The Committee for a Responsible Federal Budget, a radical that tracks national spending, precocious wrote that “federal contractors person historically not received backmost pay”. The radical added that “federal contractors sometimes see premiums successful their bids to relationship for uncertainty successful being paid”.

Most contractor employees are not considered by the national authorities to beryllium essential, and the contractor decides whether to let them to instrumentality paid clip disconnected oregon usage furloughs oregon layoffs, said Nichole D Atallah, a spouse astatine the PilieroMazza instrumentality steadfast successful Washington, DC.

“The authorities mostly does not wage contractors for wages employees would person different earned had they worked,” Atallah said.

Jackson Lewis, a nationalist employment and labour instrumentality firm, wrote successful 2023 that past authorities shutdowns person led to a imperishable nonaccomplishment of income for galore national authorities contractors.

Lawyers caution that not each declaration is the same.

The authorities has said successful the past that successful the lack of appropriations, agencies indispensable bounds obligations to those needed to support beingness and property.

In 2023, immoderate Senate Democrats, including Smith, projected a measure to wage national contractors immoderate backmost pay, but it did not advance. Smith is moving connected a akin connection successful the lawsuit of a shutdown.

Our ruling

Koh said, “If the authorities shuts down, members of Congress inactive get paid. The janitors ne'er get paid.”

Members of the House and Senate proceed to get paid during a shutdown. Federal instrumentality says that national employees get backmost pay, but the instrumentality does not widen that to contractors, a radical that includes galore janitors. Some backstage employers with national contracts whitethorn find ways to wage their employees, but determination is thing successful national instrumentality that requires it.

We complaint this statement: Mostly True.

*Researcher Caryn Baird contributed to this information check*