Braxton Taylor
Military spouses have been caught in the crosshairs of recent Office of Personnel Management directives regarding remote work and provisional personnel, with many left fighting for clarification of the new policies and their jobs.
An Army spouse less than six weeks from gaining a permanent position with the U.S. Department of Agriculture lost her job via email Feb. 14. She had a telework agreement that she rarely used, opting to go into the office five days a week, and had stellar performance ratings.
Yet when the Office of Personnel Management issued a memo Feb. 12 exempting spouses of active-duty personnel with remote work agreements from a new requirement that federal workers return to their offices full time, she — and an unknown number of other military spouses — weren’t included.
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“I’m trying to understand why only remote military spouses are exempt from this executive order,” said the wife, who requested anonymity because she hopes to be reinstated. “It feels as though my husband’s service and our family’s sacrifices for this country don’t matter.”
House Democrats are wondering the same. On Monday, a group of 13 lawmakers wrote OPM Acting Director Charles Ezell and Secretary of State Marco Rubio calling for reinstatement or approval of remote or telework agreements for military spouses who were in place before Jan. 20.
The group, led by Rep. Gerry Connolly of Virginia, ranking member of the Oversight and Government Reform Committee, and Rep. Jasmine Crockett of Texas, the committee’s vice ranking member, requested clarification on OPM’s policies regarding eligibility under current exemptions and telework versus remote work for this population.
“Military-connected families rely on telework and remote work opportunities for economic stability, which helps enable these families to continue serving our country,” wrote the lawmakers.
President Donald Trump issued an executive order Jan. 20 ending remote work for most federal agencies and departments, a directive clarified by the Office of Management and Budget in a memo Jan. 27 that included a footnote stating that agencies should “exclude military spouses working remotely based on the Military Spouse Employment Act.”
The footnote was later addressed by OPM in an announcement that stated spouses of active-duty troops who worked remotely were categorically exempt from the return-to-work requirement.
At the same time, the Trump administration has fired thousands of federal workers — most probationary employees who have not worked for the government long enough to have complete civil service protections.
Army wife Rachael Shaw was one of those employees. A data analytics fellow at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, she was fired via email on Feb. 14 but was later reinstated following a public uproar over dismissals in her office, which manages the World Trade Center Health Program for 9/11 first responders and survivors.
During an interview with Military.com, she said the firings have the potential to hurt military recruitment and retention. She said that, while her husband has been in the Army more than 17 years and planned to stay past retirement eligibility, her firing had them thinking otherwise.
“[The government] finally recognized that military spouse unemployment is a big factor, probably, in recruitment and retention,” Shaw said. “Most spouses want to have a career nowadays, so if you make that harder than it needs to be, I think it will impact people’s choices [on whether to stay in].”
The unemployment rate among military spouses is 21%, more than five times the national rate. The number of military spouses who have been fired under the new directives has not been published. But Democratic lawmakers say the dismissals have affected roughly 6,000 veterans, including 258 at the Department of Veterans Affairs and 2,300 at the Defense Department.
The Trump administration argues that the cuts are needed to reduce the size of the federal government and slash the national debt, which now totals more than $36 trillion. Most Republican lawmakers say the cuts may be harsh but are necessary to safeguard taxpayer dollars.
“If we don’t sensibly handle our budget in this nation and China owns our debt, then you will all have fought for naught,” House Veterans Affairs Rep. Mike Bost, R-Ill., told a panel of veterans service organizations during a hearing on veterans issues Wednesday.
Sen. Lisa Murkowski, R-Alaska, said she shares the goal to reduce the size of the federal government but described the abrupt firings as doing “more harm than good.”
“This approach is bringing confusion, anxiety, and now trauma to our civil servants — some of whom moved their families and packed up their whole lives to come here,” Murkowski said in a Feb. 14 post on the social media platform X, referring to her state.
The Army spouse who lost her job at the Department of Agriculture said she voted for Trump, largely because she believes in fiscal responsibility as a key to her children’s futures. Nonetheless, she never saw her dismissal coming and is now grieving for her job.
“I finally started feeling like I belonged somewhere,” she said.
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