Oversight Committee approves GOP reconciliation text that reshapes federal employee pay, benefits and appeal rights

The House Oversight and Reform Committee on Thursday approved its portion of the fiscal year 2025 budget reconciliation package, advancing measures the committee’s majority says will reduce federal spending by roughly $50.9 billion over 10 years and directing the package to the House Budget Committee by a party-line margin.

The approved committee print and the amendment in the nature of a substitute include a set of changes aimed at federal personnel costs: a shift in how retirement annuities are calculated (moving the base from the highest three years to the highest five years of pay for most employees), an option that would allow some new hires to be placed in an ‘‘at‑will’’ employment category, elimination of the FERS annuity supplement for most employees not already receiving it, a new $350 filing fee for Merit Systems Protection Board appeals, and several provisions related to union use of official time and reimbursement for agency resources. The chair said those changes — along with targeted exemptions for certain frontline occupations — are part of the reconciliation offsets required by House budget instructions.

Why it matters: The package targets longstanding civil‑service rules and benefits in ways supporters call necessary to curb federal compensation and reduce taxpayer costs; opponents say the provisions will cut pay and protections for millions of federal employees, undermine nonpartisan civil service protections, and risk disruptions to services that rely on the federal workforce, including veterans’ care and food‑safety inspections.

Major provisions and committee debate

The committee print and substitute (as opened and described at the hearing) propose multiple personnel changes that the majority framed as fiscal reforms. Chairman Comer (chair, House Oversight and Reform Committee) described the markup as an opportunity to advance the House majority’s reconciliation offsets and said the committee’s measures fit within the limited jurisdiction to address civil‑service benefits and governance.

Representative Lynch (member, House Oversight and Reform Committee) led Democratic opposition and repeatedly argued the package amounted to an “assault on the federal workforce,” citing…