Federal employees at the Department of Education and other agencies have been unwitting carriers of partisan messages, as their out-of-office email replies were altered to blame Democrats for the government shutdown, without their consent; this situation has raised both ethical and legal concerns, reported NBC News. Employees, speaking on the condition of anonymity, expressed alarm over the changes, which contravened the nonpartisan language they had originally set and feared the potential Hatch Act violations, as the act limits federal employees' political activity. One individual, indicative of the group's frustration, stated, "None of us consented to this. And it’s written in the first person, as if I’m the one conveying this message, and I’m not. I don’t agree with it. I don’t think it’s ethical or legal. I think it violates the Hatch Act," NBC News reported.
The automatic notifications suggested that the shutdown was due to "Democrat Senators blocking the passage of H.R. 5371," a narrative which swiftly permeated various agency websites as well; however, this has not been the message for all federal workers, since some addressed queries with neutral out-of-office messages, but others had their messages changed without permission, leaving them concerned about the implications for their professional reputations, a situation which was mirrored across agencies such as the Department of Health and Human Services and the Small Business Administration—the former urging employees to use out-of-office messages placing responsibility for the shutdown on Democrats, and the latter sharing shock at the leadership’s guidance to embrace the politicized language, as conveyed in an interview by a worker to CNN.
Moreover, Public Citizen, a nonprofit consumer advocacy organization, took action by filing a complaint against the Small Business Administration and Department of Housing and Urban Development, arguing that the partisan messages appearing on their websites were in breach of the Hatch Act. Echoing similar concerns, Richard Painter, former chief White House ethics lawyer, highlighted to CNN that forcing federal workers to communicate these messages could be seen as a severe form of coercion, potentially infringing on multiple laws.
"If you coerce someone to send a message, let’s just say they say, 'You need to send a message blaming the Democrats for the shutdown, or you get fired,' I think that’s a violation. But then let’s go to the next step and say, well, instead of doing that, they just seize control of your email, because you’re out of the office, and you’re not allowed to go in your email, and they put out an email with your name on it, isn’t that coercion? I think that’s coercion," pointing out the gravity of the administration's interference with individual communication, Painter said in a statement obtained by CNN. The Department of Education itself has yet to provide a full explanation, with its Deputy Assistant Secretary for Communications, Madi Biedermann, defending the contentious wording as a mere reminder of the circumstances caused by the Senate's inaction.
