CINCINNATI — With no apparent end in sight to the government shutdown, some of Cincinnati's federal workforce rallied Tuesday as they grapple with the fallout, from furloughs to threats of more layoffs.
"(It's) scary, terrifying, uncertain," Regina Parker, president of National Treasury Employees Union (NTEU) Chapter 9, said. "We're attacked, verbally, we're being told that we're lazy, yet we're here working, and the ones making the budget aren't. What more can we do?"
NTEU Chapter 9 represents Cincinnati Internal Revenue Service (IRS) employees. Parker said approximately 200 to 250 of those union workers have been furloughed as a result of the shutdown.
"You're not sitting at home just doing nothing. You're worrying about your job. You're worried about how you're going to put food on the table for your kids or for yourself," Parker said.
WATCH: Cincinnati federal workers gathered to share shutdown impacts. Here's what they had to say
It is unclear at this point just how many total federal employees in Cincinnati have been furloughed or laid off over the last two weeks. In a court filing on Oct. 10, the White House Office of Management and Budget (OMB) stated more than 4,000 civil servants received layoff notices, also called reduction-in-force notices.
In a social media post Tuesday, the OMB indicated more layoffs would be coming with the shutdown positioned to enter a third week.
"Pay the troops, pay law enforcement, continue the RIFs, and wait," the post reads in part.
"At the outset, I said either the shutdown is going to be three days or it's going to go on around three weeks," Gary Roth, a steward for the American Federation of Government Employees (AFGE) Local 3840 chapter, said. "Right now we're at week two, but it doesn't really look like they're quite getting there at week three."
Roth has been with the CDC's National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health (NIOSH) for around a decade. He spoke with us Tuesday, not as a NIOSH employee but as a union steward. On the first day of the shutdown, Oct. 1, the father of four received a furlough notice.
"I will say that it has added a lot of stress and uncertainty," Roth said. "It's stressful because, one, I don't know if I'm going to get that back pay. Two, I don't know if I'm going to receive a termination notice."
Last week, President Donald Trump suggested that some workers may not receive legally-mandated back pay when the shutdown ends, as laid out in the Government Employee Fair Treatment Act of 2019.
"I didn't want to have to try and navigate the unemployment system and rush into a job search now, but it looks like I have to, because I need a hedge against the possibility that that all occurs," Roth said.
Marking day 14 of the federal funding stalemate, the U.S. Senate is scheduled to vote on a clean funding bill Tuesday night. It is expected to fail for an eighth time.
