The Senate is slated to vote at 12 noon Eastern time today on a stopgap budget bill that could end the partial government shutdown that began Friday.
The bill, which most Democrats and a few Republicans opposed Friday, would restore funding for the Department of Energy (DOE) and other federal agencies through Feb. 8. It would be the fourth continuing resolution of fiscal 2018, which began Oct. 1.
The agency’s National Nuclear Security Administration (NNSA) would get the annualized equivalent of about $13 billion under the bill, while the Environmental Management office would get the equivalent of around $6.4 billion. The Nuclear Regulatory Commission, the independent agency that regulates civilian nuclear power, would be funded at a $1-billion level.
Notwithstanding the shutdown — still officially in effect at deadline Sunday for Weapons Complex Morning Briefing — DOE civil servants and contractors were expected to report for work Monday, as were Nuclear Regulatory Commission personnel.
In a statement Friday, DOE said agency personnel would be on the job to start the week unless they hear differently from their supervisors.
“All DOE federal employees are expected to report to work on your next scheduled work day and subsequent work days unless you have previously approved leave or are given formal notice by your management not to report to work,” the agency wrote in a statement emailed to the press. “Similarly, contractors should continue to execute on contracts unless and until otherwise notified.”
A DOE spokesperson did not reply to a request for comment Sunday evening about whether the agency planned furloughs for Monday. The department plans to issue further guidance to contractors early this week, one source said Sunday evening.
In its official lapse of appropriations plan, DOE warned Friday that “a prolonged lapse in appropriations may require subsequent employee furloughs.”
In the near term the agency can keep working with money appropriated in fiscal 2017, but not yet spent. In a shutdown, agencies may only keep people on the job for reasons “related to the safety of human life or the protection of property,” according to an official DOE order updated Friday.
That would include personnel within the NNSA who transport U.S. nuclear weapons and nuclear-weapon components. The weapons and their parts are often on the move — either between DOE sites or between DOE and Defense Department facilities — as part of the NNSA’s ongoing mission to maintain and refurbish U.S. nuclear warheads. Even if the shutdown stretches out, the agency’s Office of Secure Transportation would be permitted to exempt some employees from furloughs for as long as it takes to lock down weapon components at a secure site.
The NNSA and the rest of the government shut down at 12:01 a.m. Saturday. Democrats seek legal protections for young people brought into the country illegally, and Republicans who control Congress so far refuse to include any such protection in a short-term spending bill.
