Politics

Pay Increases For Top Officials Frozen Until After Government Shutdown

The Office of Personnel Management has instructed federal agencies to hold off on enacting raises for dozens of senior officials.

Pay Increases For Top Officials Frozen Until After Government Shutdown
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Top government officials will have to wait to get their pay raises until after the partial government shutdown is over.

According to several reports, the Office of Personnel Management has instructed federal agencies to hold off on enacting raises for dozens of senior officials, including Vice President Mike Pence and Cabinet members.

The $10,000-per-year raises were supposed to go into effect on Saturday after Congress failed to renew a longstanding freeze on them.

But the OPM said in a memo Friday it "believes it would be prudent for agencies to continue to pay these senior political officials at the frozen rate until appropriations legislation is enacted that would clarify the status of the freeze."

The news comes as hundreds of thousands of federal employees continued to work without pay or not at all as the government shutdown wears on. Officials are expected to meet on Saturday to continue negotiations to get things up and running again.