administrative-leave

1. October 19, 2026News2 receipts4 min

   OPM's final rule lets agencies provide paid administrative leave during RIF notice periods and deferred-resignation transitions, and names accepted benefits a valid reason to decline a resignation withdrawal

   The Office of Personnel Management's final rule, published October 19, lets an agency provide administrative leave during a reduction-in-force notice period and to employees who sign a written agreement to voluntarily separate on a specified future date. It also adds an employee's acceptance of deferred-resignation benefits to the nonexclusive list of valid reasons an agency may decline a resignation withdrawal. OPM says it received 30 comments. The rule takes effect November 18, 2026.

   Also filed underfederal-employeesopmreduction-in-forcedeferred-resignationfederal-register

2. October 4, 2026News2 receipts3 min

   GAO: the Interagency Council on Homelessness put 11 of 13 staff on 10 months' leave under an executive order a court found it implemented unlawfully; 8 are back, awaiting direction

   A U.S. Government Accountability Office report, published and publicly released October 2, 2026, says 11 of the U.S. Interagency Council on Homelessness's 13 employees spent 10 months on paid administrative leave, beginning in April 2025 after a March 2025 executive order told the agency to cut staff to the statutory minimum. A federal court found USICH's implementation of that order unlawful and set the actions aside. Eight employees returned in mid-February 2026; as of September 2026 they had no direction from the Council or the executive director.

   Also filed underusichhomelessnessgaofederal-workforceoversight

3. September 16, 2026News1 receipt4 min

   Federal agencies spent $9.5 billion on salary for people who were not working. GAO says $6.7 billion of it was the deferred resignation program — and no one is tracking the rest of it separately.

   GAO's September 15 report finds that federal use of paid administrative leave rose 435 percent between 2023 and 2025, and that agencies in its review spent an estimated $9.5 billion in salary costs on it in 2025 — six times the 2023 figure. About $6.7 billion of that is attributed to the deferred resignation program, under which OPM let employees who agreed to resign or retire stop working immediately and be paid through September 30, 2025. The finding underneath the money is an accounting one: workforce-reduction leave is booked in the same bucket as ordinary administrative leave, so, in GAO's words, OPM 'does not know the actual costs' of it. GAO also found agencies reported 144 percent more paid administrative leave in pay periods containing a public holiday — holidays being logged as administrative leave — and OPM does not plan to fix the published historical data.

   Also filed undergaofederal-workforceopmpublic-spending

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