WASHINGTON — Over two weeks into the government shutdown and following President Donald Trump’s warning that furloughed employees may not receive back pay, Iowa Republican U.S. Sen. Joni Ernst said she supports retroactive pay for these employees after the impasse ends. Iowa Republican U.S. Rep. Mariannette Miller-Meeks questioned the legality and constitutionality of giving back pay. 

Roughly 750,000 federal employees have been furloughed, and nearly as many are continuing to work without pay. 

“This would be delayed pay if people are not working, but then are paid for not working, and then you have to ask yourself, how fair is that to the rest of the individuals who, if they’re laid off or furloughed, they’re without pay? So why should federal employees be treated any differently?” Miller-Meeks said in a sit-down interview with The Daily Iowan. 

A draft memo from the White House — undisclosed to the public and first reported by Axios on Oct. 7 — said a 2019 law signed by Trump guaranteeing retroactive pay after a shutdown did not apply to employees who had been temporarily asked not to go to work.

The law, the Government Employee Fair Treatment Act, states federal employees are entitled to retroactive pay in the event of a government shutdown. It followed the longest shutdown in U.S. history — 35 days in 2018 during Trump’s first term. 

Trump’s statement has received backlash from politicians and could result in a legal fight brought to the U.S. Supreme Court. 

Iowa’s congressional delegation has opted to withhold their own paychecks until the shutdown ends. 

“It’s really unfair that Congress gets paid and the furloughed workers don’t. So every senator in Congress will make that choice, but the entire Iowa delegation said, ‘We will defer our paychecks until everybody else is paid as well,’” Ernst said. 

Both Ernst and Miller-Meeks support Trump’s plan to cut “nonessential” workers from the federal government during the shutdown.

Miller-Meeks said Trump’s plan is a way to stimulate a conversation questioning the size and efficiency of the U.S. government. Ernst said the shutdown allows the Trump administration to reduce “waste and bloat” in the federal government. 

“If there are nonessential employees out there, this is a time that the President and his team do have available to them to go ahead and do a reduction in forces, and that I could support, as long as they are eliminating those nonessential government workers,” she said. 

Furloughed employees in Iowa City VA

Patrick Kearns, nurse at the Iowa City Veterans Affairs Medical Center and president of a local chapter of the American Federation of Government Employees, a labor union for federal employees, said information technology employees at the center have been furloughed. 

With the potential threat of losing back pay, IT employees are navigating how to pay their bills as the shutdown stretches on. 

“I’ve been through this a number of times; it makes you wonder, how valuable does Congress see the federal workforce when they play these games with our lives?” Kearns said. 

While Kearns’ pay has not yet been affected, he said Trump’s statements on the federal work force and an email from the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs to Iowa City VA workers make him nervous. 

Kearns described the email, sent to the center on Sept. 30, as a “partisan attack.” 

“Unfortunately, Democrats are blocking this continuing resolution in the U.S. Senate due to unrelated policy demands,” a Sept. 30 email obtained by The Daily Iowan said. “If Congressional Democrats maintain their current posture and refuse to pass a clean continuing resolution to keep the government funded before midnight on Sept. 30, 2025, federal appropriated funding will lapse.”

Kearns said a reason he loves his job at the VA clinic is that, regardless of personal opinions, feelings, or politics, care is always provided to those who need it. This is threatened by statements such as those in the VA’s email, Kearns said. 

A VA nurse for 30 years, Kearns said he’s worked through his fair share of government shutdowns, but he’s never seen one so politically polarizing. 

 ‘Voting for politics’

The current shutdown is the first in over five years and resulted in a standoff between Senate Republicans and Democrats over health care spending. 

University of Iowa economics professor Anne Villamil said shutdowns have become a more frequent form of political negotiation. 

“The bigger picture here is that shutting down the government is a negotiating tactic,” Vilamill said. “It’s not, in my view, the best negotiating tactic, but it’s clearly a negotiating tactic,” she said. 

The government has shut down seven times since the 1990s.   

Both parties are pointing fingers as to who is responsible for the current shutdown, although a September  NPR/PBS News/Marist poll shows more Americans hold Republicans responsible.  

Iowa Democratic Party Chair Rita Hart released a statement on Oct.7, claiming Iowa Republicans are refusing to work to end the “Trump shutdown.” 

“Iowans deserve more than out-of-touch politicians who don’t do anything about rising health care costs,” she said in the statement. “Voters will remember this next November.”

Iowa Republicans called on Senate Democrats to set aside their demands for the new budget – to restore many of the funds cut from Medicaid and subsidies for the Affordable Care Act insurance plans – to pass a continuing resolution and avoid a shutdown. 

“[Senate Democrats] can vote for people,” Miller-Meeks said. “Instead, they’re voting for politics.”