The 119th Congress is set to begin in just a few weeks, and Rep. James Comer (R-KY), who chairs the House Oversight Committee, is offering something of a preview in a letter delivered electronically to former Social Security Administration (SSA) Commissioner Martin O'Malley. Monday's letter, delivered electronically, puts O'Malley on notice that he will be invited to testify before the Committee at a hearing next month on federal agency telework.
"Among other issues concerning the absentee federal workforce, the hearing will address existing agreements between federal agencies and federal employee unions that purport to prevent incoming executive branch officials appointed by President Trump from telling their own employees – and those of the American people – to show up to work. To better understand the rationale underlying collective bargaining agreements (CBAs) such as the one you recently signed in your capacity as Commissioner of the Social Security Administration (SSA), we intend to issue you a formal invitation to testify at the hearing," Comer's letter read early on.
O'Malley served as the SSA Commissioner until last month, when he announced he was resigning to run for the role of DNC chairman. While still serving in his role, O'Malley signed an agreement last month with the American Federation of Government Employees (AFGE) that guarantees minimum telework levels for 42,000 SA employees all the way through 2029. Such a timeline conveniently covers until President-elect Donald Trump is no longer in office, and O'Malley thus puts his successor in a difficult position, as Comer made it a point to mention in his letter.
"Thus, you managed the SSA workforce for only a few days under a CBA that will tie the hands of your successor at SSA for the duration of the next Administration, and beyond. Your motive for signing such an agreement is unclear, nor is it clear why the public interest is served by having a departing official of a lame duck Administration determine the work arrangements to occur at an agency for years after he is gone. Democracy is best served when an incoming, duly elected President and his appointees are empowered to actually manage the workforce they are charged with overseeing. The SSA CBA seems intended to prevent just that. It was, however, extremely popular with the AFGE members—who you partied with in Florida shortly before signing it—and with other public employee unions that form a core constituency of the DNC that you are now running to chair," Comer's letter charged, citing reporting from The Daily Wire.
The COVID pandemic is over, and yet, as Comer's letter laid out, SSA workers still have not returned to pre-pandemic levels of working in office.
"On your watch, SSA employees have been notably absent from the office. Nearly all of the 58,875 SSA employees are deemed telework eligible, and according to the Administration’s own data, they have been spending less than half their time in the office," Comer's letter laid out, citing an Office of Management and Budget (OMB) report to Congress from August. "This failure to show up runs parallel to failures at SSA to accomplish its mission. SSA is charged with administering 'the Social Security retirement, survivors, and disability insurance programs' and running 'the Supplemental Security Income program, for people who are 65 or older, blind, or with a disability,'" Comer continued, citing the USA government website.
Comer further laid out the failures, noting how "SSA is failing to adequately serve the American people, as SSA disability determination processing times on average 'have increased since fiscal year 2020'" and "have yet to return to pre pandemic levels."
Such is one more way in which Trump will be quite the improvement to the failing Biden-Harris administration about to come to an end, as Comer's letter noted that "President Trump, in contrast, recognized that SSA employees' failure to show up was a problem when he ended telework for some SSA employees 'to improve service delivery and to focus all of operations resources on providing service to [SSA] customers' in October 2019."
"We believe your testimony will shed light on why so much of the federal workforce is currently at home, and federal agency offices are largely vacant. We also expect it will educate Members as to how federal collective bargaining law and practice has helped facilitate this situation," Comer wrote to conclude his letter.
🚨MARTIN O’MALLEY MUST TESTIFY ABOUT FEDERAL AGENCY TELEWORK🚨
— Oversight Committee (@GOPoversight) December 23, 2024
On November 18, 2024, the NYT announced Martin O’Malley, Commissioner of the Social Security Administration, was running for DNC chair. Nine days later, just as O’Malley was about to leave the SSA, he signed an… pic.twitter.com/0yvJ6e2u3R
This is not the only time that the Committee has reached out to O'Malley and other federal bureaucrats. On December 6, Comer and Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-GA), who is the incoming DOGE Subcommittee chairwoman, sent letters to 24 federal agencies, including SSA, calling on them to stop trying to "Trump-proof" the federal bureaucracy.
Comer also outlined his agenda last week in an op-ed that was published in The Washington Times, "Holding the federal bureaucracy accountable."
Telework policies for federal workers have been in the news plenty as of late. Earlier this month, Sen. Joni Ernst (R-IA) held her first DOGE meeting with Elon Musk and Vivek Ramaswamy and she also released a damning "Out of Office" report on the levels of federal employees using telework. "Most federal employees are eligible to telework and 90 percent of those are. Some come to the office as infrequently as once a week," a summary of her report mentioned in part. The Delivering Outstanding Government Efficiency (DOGE) caucus also met for the first time earlier this month, with both Democrats and Republicans.
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