Mayorkas grants DHS staff 24 hours administrative leave; official says survivors can switch benefits in 2030

Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas announced at a farewell ceremony in Hitchcock Hall at Department of Homeland Security headquarters in Washington, D.C., that he will grant all Department of Homeland Security personnel 24 hours of administrative leave and will follow up with a memo.

The announcement came alongside an onstage report from Benjamin Kari Huffman, director of the Federal Law Enforcement Training Centers and former acting commissioner of U.S. Customs and Border Protection, who described a change affecting survivors of employees who died of COVID-related illness between Jan. 2020 and Jan. 2023: he said they will have the ability to switch from American Rescue Plan Act (ARPA) benefits to Office of Personnel Management (OPM) benefits in 2030 if a legislative fix has not been finalized.

"I am proud this one last time, to grant you, all personnel, 24 hours of administrative leave," Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas said at the close of the ceremony and added that he would "follow-up with a memo." The announcement capped a series of speakers who emphasized Mayorkas's focus on workforce care during his tenure.

Benjamin Kari Huffman described efforts prompted by concerns from survivors whose benefits were affected by ARPA. He said he briefed Mayorkas after learning that some survivors had received letters indicating benefits would expire in 2030 and that the secretary's response was, "This cannot stand." Huffman said he was told to prepare a note explaining the situation and to send it directly to the secretary.

Huffman summarized the practical difference survivors face when choosing benefits: the Federal Employees' Compensation Act (FECA) generally provides about 75% of the employee's salary and is nontaxable, while OPM survivor benefits are about 50% of salary and taxable, and once a survivor chooses one option it cannot be changed. He told the audience that employees who died between Jan. 2020 and Jan. 2023 were affected by ARPA provisions and that "now our survivors will now have the ability to switch from ARPA to OPM benefits in 2020, 2030 if a legislative solution is not finalized by them," adding that he did not know the full particulars of how the change would be implemented.

The ceremony featured multiple speakers praising Mayorkas's workforce initiatives, including references earlier in the program to his practice of granting administrative leave days to staff. Speakers credited those awards and other workplace changes with improvements in employee morale across DHS components.

The benefit change described by Huffman was presented as the outcome of staff work and a follow-up directive rather than a completed statutory change. Huffman explicitly cautioned that he did not know all particulars of what happened after the secretary received the note. The statement that survivors "will have the ability to switch" was reported onstage by Huffman and not framed in the ceremony as a completed statutory reversal or as the result of a specific published OPM rule included in the record.

The event was a farewell ceremony with remarks from senior DHS and White House officials. Beyond the two workforce items above, speakers reflected on Mayorkas's tenure and his stated priorities; no formal votes or motions beyond the secretary's announced administrative-leave grant were recorded in the transcript.

Ending: The administrative-leave announcement is immediate and the secretary said a memo will follow. The reported survivors' benefit change was described onstage as a result of staff work and the secretary's intervention; Huffman said further particulars were not known and indicated that a legislative solution would still be required if an OPM rule change did not fully resolve the issue.