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Federal Workers Paid $9.5 Billion to Not Work in 2025 Under Trump’s DOGE Effort
Confirmed
In Short: The Trump administration spent an estimated $9.5 billion on paid administrative leave for federal workers as part of its cost-cutting efforts, according to a Government Accountability Office report.
The Trump administration spent an estimated $9.5 billion last year on paid administrative leave for federal workers as part of its cost-cutting efforts, according to a Government Accountability Office report released Tuesday.
The use of paid administrative leave increased by 435% from 2023 to 2025, with salary costs rising sixfold, NBC News reported.
Much of the increased leave cost — about $6.7 billion — came from salary paid through a DOGE-era ‘deferred resignation program,’ the GAO found.
Nearly 140,000 federal employees opted into the program, which allowed workers to resign while still receiving full pay and benefits through the end of the fiscal year, according to the Office of Personnel Management.
What's confirmed
- The Trump administration spent an estimated $9.5 billion last year on paid administrative leave for federal workers as it pushed to cut costs by shrinking the government, according to a Government Accountability Office report released Tuesday.
What's still developing
- “To calculate long-term savings, OPM needs to know short-term costs of paid administrative leave used for these efforts,” the report explained.
- “However, OPM cannot easily and accurately do this because the paid administrative leave used for workforce reduction efforts is reported with other types of general paid administrative leave.” The deferred resignation program was unveiled just days into Trump’s second term, and federal workers received a “Fork in the Road” email laying out their options.
- A recent watchdog report reveals that federal employees were paid nearly $7 billion to not work under the Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) initiative.
- The report analyzed payroll data from 76 agencies, covering about 95% of the civilian federal workforce.