Parties Spar Over "Show Up" Act
Now that the pandemic emergency is over, House Republicans want federal employees to come back to their offices. The Stopping Home Office Work Unproductive Problems Act or SHOW UP Act of 2023 introduced by Rep. James Comer (R-Ken) was passed by a vote of 221-206.
Rep. Jamie Raskin (D-Md) called the GOP "hypocritical. These are the guys who say they want to shrink the government by cutting unneeded bureaucracy. Now they want these supposedly unneeded employees to travel into the city to work? Won't this increased traffic congestion impede the private sector workers who actually produce products and services that customers willingly buy?"
Rep. Gerry Connolly (D-Va) echoed Raskin's take, saying "none of us in Congress has any idea of what these workers do or don't do. What difference would it make to us whether the unknown activities of these federal employees takes place at home or at the office?"
The issue has been confounded by the fact that thousands of these employees supposedly "working from home" falsely "self-certified" as unemployed during the covid pandemic in order to fraudulently receive payments for being out of work. Comer cited this behavior as a reason to simplify the work environment by having the government's employees show up at the office. Raskin cited "the small number of crooks--less than ten thousand from what I hear--seems to be petty theft compared to the trillions that have been frittered away over the last two years."
DC Mayor Muriel Bowser (D) suggested that "the unused office space created by the widespread use of telecommuting as the basic work model could be put to better use housing the City's homeless population. Bringing these mentally ill drug-users to live closer to where Congress does its business might inspire them to take the problem more seriously."
In other Capital news, a dozen students from Our Lady of the Rosary School in Greenville County, South Carolina were kicked out of the Smithsonian National Air and Space Museum because they were wearing hats with a pro-life message. Secretary Lonnie G. Bunch III explained "pro-life is not the policy of our organization. It would be improper to allow outsiders to advocate for an unapproved political position within the walls of the museum."
