Will furloughed workers receive backpay during the government shutdown?

Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
Well, McKenzie, I don't know if you're being going to

(00:01):
be flying anywhere. You're going out of town this weekend, right,
you're going to go see your dad play at the
Shrimp Festival down.

Speaker 2 (00:05):
I am, but luckily I can drive.

Speaker 1 (00:07):
Yeah. Is that Golf Shores.

Speaker 2 (00:08):
It is Golf Shores.

Speaker 3 (00:09):
Yeah.

Speaker 2 (00:09):
It's a big event every fall, every October.

Speaker 1 (00:12):
I mean he's in a band, so you're going he's
going to be playing.

Speaker 2 (00:16):
Yeah, this will be their third year in a row playing.
I didn't make it last year. I went his first year.

Speaker 1 (00:20):
How many people show up for this thing?

Speaker 2 (00:22):
There's a good amount of people. I mean there's bands
alder all the day. Yeah, and I mean they've got
so many vendors that are set up. I mean there's
a lot of shrimp, a lot of arts. It's really
heavy on art. So I mean, you know kind of
like you know the fall festival season. It just plays
right in hand with the Gulf Coast, so it's perfect.

Speaker 1 (00:38):
Is the one day event ers that go on for
a while. It goes on I think starts Friday, Saturday
and Sunday.

Speaker 2 (00:43):
Right, Yeah, it's all weekend, but he plays Friday, so
I will be out.

Speaker 1 (00:47):
Friday enjoy that. That'll be fun. I'm excited.

Speaker 2 (00:50):
The weather looks like it's going to be perfect, like
low's in the upper sixties, highs and you know, upper seventies.

Speaker 1 (00:56):
Yeah, yeah, looking great for the weekend. But yeah, I
enjoy that. Well. The government shutdown is certainly affecting some travel,
not you driving, but flying. We're seeing delays everywhere. And
The Points Guy founder Brian Kelly, explaining how the government
shutdown is making the FAA and air traffic controller staffing
shortage is worse, compares it to you know, the shutdown

(01:18):
back in twenty nineteen.

Speaker 4 (01:20):
I'm concerned air traffic system in twenty nineteen is nowhere
near as busy as it is today. And as we've
seen this year, you know, our air traffic control system
is fragile. They're overworked. We don't have enough air traffic
controllers out there, and so it's our system today is
much more fragile and busy than it was in twenty nineteen.
And it was travel that ultimately got so many people

(01:41):
upset that they demanded the government to you know, to
end the shutdown. But as we're seeing now, there's no
real uh, there's gonna be no votes this weekend. There's
no real end in sight, and there could be you know,
potentially catastrophical.

Speaker 1 (01:53):
You know, and there's also some people that are calling
in sick here. Nick Daniels, who's the president of the
National Air Traffic Controllers sogociation, was asked by the News
if the union would be organizing a sick out. Absolutely not.

Speaker 3 (02:07):
We are going to show up to work again to
serve the American people. You don't control the government opening
or the government shutting down, and we sure don't control
the government ending it.

Speaker 1 (02:17):
Yeah. I saw some people are calling in sick, and
I don't understand why that is. I guess it's in
protest to the government closing down. And they went their
jobs back and they don't have to be worried about,
you know, getting paid and whatnot. So, but Daniels also
says the controllers still need to you know, they got
to pay their bills.

Speaker 3 (02:33):
We work evening shifts, we work midnight shifts. We have
single parents, and when you're not even able to afford
the childcare, those are going to be the very difficult
decisions that are made.

Speaker 1 (02:42):
Yeah, and I saw there the president there was a
memo floating around the White House that this is going
to be controversial if this comes up, But the White
House says that there's a potential that not everybody is
owed back pay, but not so fast. Here. Apparently there
was a twenty nineteen government Employee Fair Treatment out there
that mandates that all the federal employees furload or working

(03:04):
without pay must receive back pay, you know, if you're
going through a shutdown. There, the President basically said, you know,
it depends on who you ask, and not everybody is
necessarily going to be entitled that. I would hate to
think that they would not, But you know, here's President

(03:26):
let's go cut ten. President Trump here talking about this
yesterday at the White House.

Speaker 5 (03:31):
I would say, it depends on who we're talking about.
I can tell you this. The Democrats have put a
lot of people in great risk and jeopardy. But it
really depends on who you're talking about. But for the
most part, we're going to take care of our people.
There are some people that really don't deserve to be
taken care of, and we'll take care of them in
a different way.

Speaker 1 (03:48):
Yeah. Business correspondent with Fox News Ryl Cassoni, was talking
about this. In some reaction to that statement, about the
back pay for furload workers. She believes it may be
a negotiating tact.

Speaker 6 (04:00):
My question is that a negotiating tactic. How much pressure
are you going to put on the Democrats to end
the shutdown. That's what my perception is considered. John Corny
said the same thing. He said, this is a negotiating tactic.
But the end of the day, what they're talking about
is there was this memo circulated at the White House
yesterday from the Office of Management and Budget. This is
Russ Vote, who we know has been very clear there

(04:20):
are programs he wants to cut, jobs, he wants to
cut This is his chance. We haven't had a list
of industries that are going to be cut, programs that
are going to be cut, but supposedly he.

Speaker 1 (04:30):
Has that list.

Speaker 3 (04:30):
He has a list.

Speaker 1 (04:32):
Well, there you go. So we'll see what happens with this.
But I certainly hope that these people that have been
forced out because of political back and forth, you know,
gets are paid. There's it kind of bothers me and
I get the negotiations, and you know, we can't you know,
the points in this whole thing about give illegals healthcare

(04:52):
and whatnot. Whatever you can argue that all day long.
But this is a political you know, tennis match going
on between the Democrats and Republicans. These people that are
working the air traffic control and other federal workers are
are you know, at the disposal of these guys and
wanting to shut the government down. So yeah, I think
they ought to get their back pay as well, So
we'll see it goes