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Social Security Head Drank With Union Members Before Giving Them Telework Through 2029
Martin O’Malley, the Biden administration’s Social Security Commissioner, partied with union members in Florida days before signing a contract preventing managers from reducing telework compared to the COVID era, The Daily Wire has learned.
The American Federation of Government Employees Council 220, which represents 27,500 employees of the Social Security Administration (SSA), held its Caucus Conference in Fort Lauderdale from November 12-15. The conference is where government employees plot how to extract as much as possible from management. But O’Malley, the top manager, was in attendance, drinking and singing songs with attendees, who praised him, according to materials obtained by The Daily Wire.
On November 27, O’Malley signed the agreement with the union locking in telework through 2029. Two days later, he resigned from the agency in order to run for chair of the Democratic National Committee. That means the former Maryland governor signed a contract that he would not have to live under, but other managers would. The giveaway to the union could give him cache with party activists that could help him secure the DNC gig.
Edwin Osorio, the council’s vice president, posted a picture of him out on the town at the conference, captioning it “Had a great night hanging out with the greatest commision[er] of Social Security ever had!” Video shows O’Malley regaling attendees with an Irish ballad on his guitar, crooning about “drink[ing] ourselves stupid.”
Mike Watson, a political influence researcher at the conservative-leaning Capital Research Center, said the dynamic raises questions about whether the deal was in the best interest of taxpayers and those who depend on Social Security, or whether it represented a bargaining table with both signatories on the same side.
“O’Malley partying at the AFGE conference is just a particularly vivid way to show what was already true: Unions elect their bosses, who then side with them in negotiations, while taxpayers are left out in the cold,” he said.
He said that even staunch labor activists recognized that the give-and-take between management and labor in private companies wouldn’t work in government, with Franklin Delano Roosevelt writing that “the process of collective bargaining, as usually understood, cannot be transplanted into the public service.”
Social Security commissioners’ terms can last longer than one presidential administration. Andrew Saul, O’Malley’s predecessor, had been set to lead the agency through 2025. But Biden fired him and installed O’Malley at the behest of the union, who objected to the fact that Donald Trump had initially installed Saul.
Council 220 president is Jessica Lapointe. An online photo shows her posing with a sign that says “Vote Kamala.” Lapointe’s job at the Social Security Administration is to help people who don’t speak English get Social Security checks.
The Social Security Administration union agreement, obtained by The Daily Wire, is structured as a resolution to various years-old “grievances,” meaning O’Malley could have signed it earlier, but did not. The agreement doesn’t just lock administration employees into a level of work-from-home flexibility that began with a global pandemic, but it takes away management’s historic rights to dictate work terms.
The grievances claim “disparate treatment of or disparate impact on unspecified minority and/or disabled bargaining unit employees. The Grievances are dated: February 11, 2015; February 11, 2016; April 24, 2017 (amended January 31, 2018); June 27, 2018; October 9, 2019; March 23, 2020; and June 21, 2021.”
The union agreed to drop the grievances in exchange for doing away with existing language that management “will determine the number of scheduled telework days, if any, eligible positions, and percentage of employees permitted to telework,” and replacing it with “Each Deputy Commissioner will adhere to the current number of telework days, eligible positions, and percentage of employees permitted to telework as of the date of this agreement until October 25, 2029.”
It changed “Management has sole discretion to change, reduce, suspend, or eliminate approved telework day(s)” to “temporarily change.” That means that the Trump administration, which has suggested it wants to bring employees back to the office, could try its hand at “temporarily” eliminating telework for a period of multiple years, though that would probably lead to a legal dispute.
Also remaining in the memorandum of understanding is “Management also has sole discretion to change, reduce, or suspend approved telework day(s) for any employee due to the employee’s performance.” The Trump administration might be able to construe that as applying, for example, to all but the most exemplary employees.
The Social Security Administration did not respond to questions about the appropriateness of its leader appearing as a celebrated guest at a union conference, and then signing a long-term contract on his way out the door. It also did not say how much taxpayer money went toward the Florida union conference.
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Taxpayers pay the salaries of employees during hours that they engage in union activities, a practice known as “official time.”
“If I were attempting to combat government inefficiency and waste,” Watson said. “I would absolutely target for elimination the practice of using taxpayer money, rather than members’ dues, to pay union officials conducting union work.”
Social Security Administration employees are tasked with getting checks to the elderly and disabled. But as they partied in Florida and sought permanent remote work, there were indications that work was not getting done. Disabled people have to wait more than half a year for employees to make a determination, on average, if they are eligible for Social Security.
It’s possible O’Malley did not agree to give up management rights earlier because President Joe Biden didn’t think telework was a good idea — raising the prospect of whether the goal was simply to sandbag the agency under the Trump administration. The Biden administration spent $120 million renovating Social Security’s headquarters, even though it is 91% unoccupied because of telework. In 2022, Biden used his State of the Union address to call for a return to the office, and his chief of staff repeatedly pressed Cabinet officials to do so.
There is evidence that telework has been abused by Social Security Administration employees. In the most sensational case, an employee ran a home inspection business while he was supposedly working from home for the agency, and having his mom occasionally send emails from his account was enough to get away with it for three years.
“The Biden administration clearly seems to be trying to bind its successor from making reforms that Trump and his allies promised,” Watson said.
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