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A2 U.S. NEWS
Wednesday 8 OctOber 2025

Trump administration threatens no back

pay for federal workers in shutdown

A title sign sits outside a Planned Parenthood branch, May
16, 2023, in Pasadena, Calif.
Associated Press

A judge has blocked a

Trump administration effort

to change teen pregnancy

prevention programs

The Capitol is illuminated at dawn in Washington, Monday, Oct. 6, 2025.
Associated Press
By GEOFF MULVIHILL
By LISA MASCARO the government, now in once the government re- Associated Press
AP Congressional Core- the seventh day of a shut- opens. A judge Tuesday blocked President Donald Trump’s
spondent down. “That should turn up the administration from requiring recipients of federal teen
WASHINGTON (AP) — Presi- “There are some people urgency and the neces- pregnancy prevention grants to comply with Trump’s
dent Donald Trump’s ad- that don’t deserve to be sity of the Democrats doing orders aimed at curtailing “radical indoctrination” and
ministration warned on taken care of, and we’ll the right thing here,” House “gender ideology.”
Tuesday of no guaranteed take care of them in a dif- Speaker Mike Johnson said The ruling is a victory for three Planned Parenthood af-
back pay for federal work- ferent way,” Trump said at a press conference at filiates in California, Iowa and New York that sued to
ers during a government during an event at the the Capitol. try to block enforcement of a U.S. Department of Hu-
shutdown, reversing what White House. Johnson, a lawyer, said he man Services policy document issued in July that they
has been long-standing He said back pay “de- hadn’t fully read the memo contend contradict the requirements of the grants as
policy for some 750,000 pends on who we’re talking but “there are some legal established by Congress.
furloughed employees, ac- about.” Asked a second analysts who are saying” U.S. District Judge Beryl Howell, who was appointed to
cording to a memo being time about backpay for that it may not be neces- the bench by former President Barack Obama, blasted
circulated by the White furloughed federal workers sary or appropriate to re- the administration’s policy change in her written ruling,
House. given that the requirement pay the federal workers. saying it was “motivated solely by political concerns,
Trump signed into law after is spelled out in law, Trump But Democratic Sen. Pat- devoid of any considered process or analysis, and ig-
the longest government said: “I follow the law, and ty Murray of Washington norant of the statutory emphasis on evidence-based
shutdown in 2019 legislation what the law says is cor- blasted the Trump adminis- programming.”
to ensure federal workers rect.” tration as defying the law. The policy requiring changes to the pregnancy preven-
receive back pay during Refusing retroactive pay to “Another baseless attempt tion program was part of the fallout from a series of ex-
any federal funding lapse. the workers, some of whom to try and scare & intimi- ecutive orders Trump signed starting in his first day back
But in the new memo, his must remain on the job as date workers by an admin- in the White House aimed at rolling back recognition
Office of Management essential employees, would istration run by crooks and of LGBTQ+ people and diversity, equity and inclusion
and Budget says back pay be a stark departure from cowards,” said Murray, who efforts.
must be provided by Con- norms and practices and is the ranking lawmaker on In the policy, the administration objected to teaching
gress, if it chooses to do so, almost certainly would be the Senate Appropriations that promotes same-sex marriage and that “normal-
as part of any bill to fund met with legal action. Committee. izes, or promotes sexual activity for minors.”
the government. While federal workers as “The letter of the law is The Planned Parenthood affiliates argued that the
The move by the Repub- well as service members as plain as can be fed- new directives were at odds with requirements of the
lican administration was of the military have often eral workers, including fur- program and that they were so vague it wasn’t clear
widely seen as a strong- missed paychecks during loughed workers, are en- what needed to be done to follow them.
arm tactic a way to pres- past shutdowns, they are titled to their backpay fol- Howell agreed.q
sure lawmakers to reopen almost always reimbursed lowing a shutdown.”q