- Federal shutdown hits day 36, leaving 1.4 million workers unpaid, desperate, and emotionally exhausted.
- Federal employees accuse the Trump administration of harassment, mass firings, and policies aimed at weakening the workforce.
- Workers face mounting financial and mental-health crises while leadership blames opponents and hints at withholding back pay.
The U.S. federal government’s shutdown has dragged into its 36th day, eclipsing the infamous 35-day record from Donald Trump’s first term and plunging more than 1.4 million workers into a nightmare of financial desperation and emotional exhaustion.
From the steps of shuttered museums to the halls of understaffed agencies, federal employees are raising their voices in unprecedented fury, branding the Trump administration “out of control” for what they call a campaign of harassment, bullying, and outright sabotage against those keeping America running without a paycheck.
“It’s become out of control, and I really hope that this shutdown is a wake-up call of how bad things have gotten,” said Micah Niemeier-Walsh, a public health specialist at the National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health (NIOSH) and vice president of the American Federation of Government Employees (AFGE) Local 3840.
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Niemeier-Walsh, who was fired earlier this year in a mass purge only to be reinstated after court intervention, captured the raw frustration shared by colleagues across the bureaucracy.
“For many agencies, like the one that I am employed by, we’ve been effectively shut down for many months already because of the reductions in force that have already happened, and all of the attacks that we’ve been seeing on the federal workforce.”
A Year of Assault on Civil Servants
This isn’t just a funding feud over border walls and Democratic priorities – it’s the latest front in what workers describe as a systematic war on the federal workforce that began long before the lights went out in Washington.
Since February, agencies have weathered waves of mass firings – many overturned or halted by federal judges – alongside brutal budget cuts, incentives for early retirements, and buyout offers designed to thin the ranks.
Now, with the shutdown stretching into November, furlough extension notices have landed in inboxes without the promised lifeline of back-pay assurances, fueling fears that the administration might renege on owed wages.
“I have never, ever, ever, ever, ever thought that we would have our government attacking government employees,” declared Omar Algeciras, a Department of Labor staffer and vice president of AFGE Local 2391.
“I think this is the epitome of harassment, bullying and attacks on people that are simply trying to do their best to provide a service or services to American workers.”
Algeciras, whose union is scrambling to support members’ mental health amid the chaos, painted a picture of a workplace unraveling from the top.
“The Trump administration’s treatment of federal workers and their unions has put significant pressure and mental health burdens on federal workers who provide services to the American public,” he said.
“This is unprecedented, it’s unnecessary and I really do think that it’s very disheartening and saddening to see and to have to talk to some of our members and remind them that they need to take a moment for themselves, not to focus on what’s being said. We’re having to take care of our union members, we’re having to take care of our co-workers, because it’s not coming from the top down any more.”
The American Federation of Government Employees, representing hundreds of thousands of affected workers, has issued urgent calls to end the stalemate without finger-pointing at Republicans or Democrats.
But behind closed doors, the anguish is palpable.
Tandy Zitkus, president of AFGE Local 898 and a furloughed employee at the Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA), described a daily ritual of dread that has become “the norm” for federal workers.
“For myself and my members, they’ve been going through this chaos and stress and anxiety since February of, from one day to the next, not knowing if they’re going to have a job,” Zitkus said.
“Since February, there’s been a constant threat every day when you get up and go to work, and it’s unfortunately nothing new.”
Zitkus, who has guided her members through unemployment filings, food bank visits, and bill deferrals, underscored the human cost: “It’s overwhelming. It’s hard to stay positive. Federal workers serve the people. They’re not politicians, and so there’s a lot of frustration being expressed to me by my members of: why is this going on, why is there a political fight going on that affects us? We’re civil servants, and we serve the American people, and we want to be able to continue to do that and be paid.”
White House Defiance: Blame Game Escalates as Trump Digs In
From the Oval Office, President Trump has shown no signs of budging, repeatedly vowing not to negotiate with Democrats until demands for border security funding are met.
The administration’s rhetoric has only intensified the pressure on workers, with threats of firings during the shutdown – swiftly blocked by courts – and ominous hints at withholding back pay.
At the heart of the controversy sits Russell Vought, director of the White House Office of Management and Budget, whose pre-inauguration comments about inflicting “trauma” on federal workers and recasting them as “villains” now haunt the crisis.
Vought’s office has been accused of leveraging the shutdown to advance that vision, deepening the divide between the executive branch and the civil servants it relies on.
White House Deputy Secretary Abigail Jackson laid the blame squarely at Democrats’ feet in a statement to reporters: “The only reason the government was shut down at all, let alone for this long, is because the Democrats decided to hold the American people hostage to push their radical, far-left policy agenda of free healthcare for illegal aliens. American families have missed paychecks and benefits because of the Democrats’ irresponsible behavior. President Trump wants the government reopen – the Democrats can choose to reopen it at any point, and they should do so immediately.”
Critics, including affected workers and labor advocates, dismiss the narrative as a deflection from the administration’s own aggressive playbook.
As food pantries report spikes in federal employee visits and mental health hotlines light up with calls from D.C. area residents, the question looms: How much longer can this standoff last before it breaks something irreparable?
For now, the civil servants – from air traffic controllers guiding planes without overtime to park rangers patrolling empty trails – continue their duty in silence, their loyalty tested but unbroken.
But as Niemeier-Walsh put it, this “wake-up call” may finally jolt the nation into reckoning with the true price of political brinkmanship.
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