WASHINGTON—House Speaker Mike Johnson (R-La.) said on Oct. 8 that he expects that federal workers will receive back pay when the government reopens.
“It’s my understanding that the law is that they would be paid,” Johnson told reporters at a news conference on Capitol Hill.
“There is some other legal analysis that’s floating around. I have [not] yet had time to dig into and read that, but it has always been the case. That is tradition and I think it is statutory law that federal employees be paid, and that’s my position. I think they should be.”
Johnson’s comments, made on the eighth day of the government shutdown, were in reference to an unpublished draft memo sent by Office of Management and Budget General Counsel Mark R. Paoletta to the agency’s director, Russ Vought….
Speaker Johnson Says Furloughed Workers Should Get Back Pay
