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FIRST ON FOX: The House Oversight Committee felt it was being extended telecommuting in the pandemic era has been “harmful” to government agencies and the training of new employees, and a new report proposed recommendations for the Trump administration to return federal workers to empty and unused federal office buildings.
Fox News Digital obtained the House Oversight Committee’s report on the Biden-Harris administration’s policy of keeping federal workers telecommuting. work from home format, even after COVID restrictions were lifted across the country and private sector workers returned to face-to-face work settings.
The report, titled “The lights are on, but everyone’s home: Why the new administration will walk into largely vacant federal agency offices,” is 41 pages long and was drafted by Republicans on the committee.
House Oversight Committee Chairman James Comer, R-Ky. (Photo/AP File)
During the last Congress, the committee investigated the extent of federal telecommuting and remote work, the degree of oversight of its use, and its impact on mission outcomes. The committee found that American taxpayers wasted “billions to pay for federally owned and leased office space that remains largely vacant.”
The report states that “physical and anecdotal evidence suggests that the (Biden) Administration’s self-reported telecommuting data overstates office attendance.”
“But even the self-reported data is staggering: Of the 2.28 million federal civilian employees, approximately 228,000 are never required to report to the office, and nearly all of the other 1.1 million employees technically eligible for telecommuting are engaged in telecommuting,” the report states. “Furthermore, telecommuting-eligible employees from multiple agencies collectively spend less than half of their work hours in the office, below the Administration’s RTO goal.”
The report added: “American taxpayers are wasting billions to pay for owned and leased federal office space that remains largely vacant. The Biden-Harris administration did little to reduce the federal footprint while maintaining massive levels of telecommuting”.
The committee also found that the Biden-Harris administration worked with federal unions and their allies to maintain “unbearably high levels of telework,” which investigators said undermined the incoming Trump administration’s ability to reduce them .
“The lights may be on in federal buildings, but too many federal bureaucrats continue to work from home,” House Oversight Committee Chairman James Comer, R-Ky., told Fox News Digital in a statement. “The House Oversight Committee’s investigation into pandemic-era extended telecommuting reveals that the Biden-Harris Administration has ceded too much authority to federal union chiefs, allowing their preference to work from home take precedence over fulfilling the agencies’ missions and serving the American people.”
Comer also told Fox News Digital that President Trump “was spectacularly elected to hold Washington accountable.”
“Our report not only identifies the many problems with massive federal telecommuting, but also proposes solutions to get federal employees back to their offices, dispose of vacant and unused federal properties, and prioritize the needs of the American people above the needs of federal bureaucrats.” said Comer. “We look forward to working with President Trump and his administration to ensure that the federal bureaucracy is fully accountable to the American people.”
Comer and the committee’s researchers said the Trump administration should base telecommuting and remote work policies “on the achievement of mission outcomes, not on employee preferences or union demands.”
They also recommended establishing automated systems to track the use of teleworking and creating “clear and measurable metrics to assess its costs and benefits.”
The new report proposed recommendations for the Trump administration to return federal workers to vacant and unused federal office buildings. (Joy Addison/Fox News)
Comer also recommends that the Trump administration impose “more frequent and timely reporting requirements on telecommuting at the agency level” to better inform executive branch officials and members of Congress.
In the meantime, Comer also recommends using the White House and central management agencies to implement an enterprise-wide telecommuting approach that prioritizes the public interest. He said the administration “shouldn’t allow a telecommuting bidding war between agencies looking to attract federal workers to transfer to each other based on what allows them to stay home the most.”
The House Oversight Committee’s report comes just hours before it holds its first hearing of the new Congress.
The hearing, entitled “stay at home Federal Workforce: Another Legacy of the Biden-Harris Administration,” is scheduled to take place at 10 a.m.
Former commissioner of the Social Security Administration Martin O’MalleyFederal City Council Board Chair Tom Davis and Rachel Greszler of the Center for Economic Policy Innovation are scheduled to testify.
O’Malley, before the end of his term, closed telecommuting agreements for 42,000 Social Security employees through 2029.
“It’s about time the federal workforce got back to working in person for the American people,” Comer told Fox News Digital last week, announcing the hearing. “The House Oversight Committee remains committed to ensuring that federal employees stand up to the American people they serve.”
NATION’S LARGEST LABOR UNION FOR FEDERAL EMPLOYEES BACKS GOP’S EFFORTS TO END REMOTE WORK
According to a Senate report written by Sen. Joni Ernst, R-Iowa, the federal government owns more than 7,000 vacant buildings and nearly 2,500 buildings that are partially vacant.
The report also states that government buildings average 12% occupancy.
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During the hearing, the committee plans to examine how the Biden-Harris administration “failed to return federal workers to the workplace” and that failure could “hinder” the incoming Trump administration’s ability to return them to because of the long-term guarantees of teleworking in the office. agreements signed with federal employee unions.
