Federal workers oppose proposed Pentagon civilian workforce cut – JP

Corrected 9:55 a.m. | The federal workers union came out swinging Thursday against a Republican proposal to reduce the size of the Pentagon’s civilian workforce.

The American Federation of Government Employees, in a letter to congressional and administration leaders, criticized a plan to purportedly save $25 billion in each of the next five years by not filling a portion of the civilian positions at the Defense Department that are vacated each year.

“The problem with this approach is that actual waste is not being cut while cutting the civilian workforce will hollow out the Department’s capabilities, repeating mistakes from the past,” wrote Julie N. Tippens, director of the union’s legislative department, in the letter to defense appropriators and authorizers, congressional leadership, top officials at the Pentagon and the director of the White House Office of Management and Budget.

The letter was obtained by CQ JP and has not previously been reported.

“Spending more money on weapon systems or force structure capabilities without the appropriate civilian support for sustainment harms readiness and lethality, increases stress on the force, and incurs additional opportunity costs, detracting from modernization,” wrote Tippens, whose organization represents about 750,000 government employees, about 250,000 of whom work for the Defense Department.