Earlier this month, a Department of Agriculture employee who works remotely was given a list of possible locations for their upcoming mandatory return to office. One location was described as a "storage unit."
Confused, the employee drove to the address, which turned out to be, in fact, a storage facility. When the employee asked the facility's owner why it might show up on a list of federal office spaces, the owner laughed and told the employee that the federal government does rent a unit there — to store a U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service boat. It doesn't have heat, windows or power.
The USDA employee notified their supervisor, but hasn't heard back. NPR spoke to 27 current employees at more than a dozen federal agencies for this story. All of them requested their names be withheld for fear of reprisal from the Trump administration for speaking out.
In a statement to NPR, USDA said it's "using a systematic process to assign over 100,000 employees to USDA office locations nationwide." It added, "Any assignment issues are being identified and addressed quickly."
As agencies scramble to comply with President Trump's Jan. 20 order terminating remote work, employees say the process has been marked by confusion, changing guidance and frustrating conditions, akin to the recent chaos over mass firings of probationary employees and the Office of Personnel Management's "What did you do last week?" emails.
Federal workers have been ordered back into offices only to face shortages of desks, computer monitors, parking and even toilet paper. Others are still waiting to find out if they will be assigned to a building near where they live or asked to relocate across the country in the coming weeks.
Some civil servants say the return-to-office mandate feels like an indirect way to get them to quit, and flies in the face of a years-long push by the federal government, predating the COVID pandemic, to encourage teleworking.
A 2024 study by the Office of Management and Budget found that of the 2.28 million civilians working across 24 federal agencies, one in 10 were in fully remote positions "where there was no expectation that they worked in-person on any regular or recurring basis." The study found 54% of employees worked fully on-site and 46% were eligible for telework.
Cumulatively, the rush to bring workers into federal offices is taking a toll across the country, federal employees told NPR, with few apparent benefits for efficiency, cost savings or productivity.
"This is not saving money for taxpayers," an employee at the U.S. Forest Service said. "The government needs to pay for heat, for electricity, for water. If you are concerned about saving money, return to office would be a low priority."
"At least I have a desk"
Many employees at agencies including the Food and Drug Administration, the Federal Aviation Administration, the Internal Revenue Service and the Bureau of Land Management have turned up at offices that don't seem equipped for the influx, they told NPR.
On the eve of the IRS' March 10 return-to-office deadline, some employees were told not to come in after all because there wasn't space for them, according to IRS employees in multiple states and screenshots of employee chat logs seen by NPR.
"At least I have a desk. Many of my team members have been in classrooms and auditoriums or had to move desks multiple times. Some were assigned to secure areas that they can't access," one employee who works at an IRS office in Texas told NPR. Those without desk assignments "were told to go to the cafeteria and wait for an email, but there's no Wi-Fi in the cafeteria," the employee said. The IRS didn't respond to a request for comment.
At the Department of Veterans Affairs, space shortages have sparked concerns among telehealth staff that crowding into offices will compromise patient care and violate privacy. A VA spokesperson told NPR the organization would make space accommodations in order to ensure veterans' access to care would remain uninterrupted and compliant with federal health privacy law.
On the first day of mandatory in-person work at the FDA's main White Oak campus in Silver Spring, Md., last week, parking lots were gridlocked and security lines were backed up, two employees told NPR. Some workers were assigned offices but not given keys, one of the employees said.
"There are all the small indignities of being in a facility never equipped for this many people: toilet paper and paper towels running out immediately, very long lines at the cafeteria, loud noise, people working in hallways," the FDA employee said.
FDA workers at White Oak are also worried about drinking water in the office after testing last year found Legionella bacteria in some buildings. Before the return to office this month, the agency sent an email this month saying the water is safe to drink. However, it didn't include new testing results, according to a copy of the email seen by NPR.
"I personally don't risk it," a second FDA employee told NPR.
In a statement to NPR, the FDA said it is "working to ensure staff remain able to conduct their important public health work." It added: "The agency continues to provide its employees with up-to-date information regarding these activities, including workspace, security, parking accommodations, as well as public transportation and alternative commuting options."
Toilet paper, computer monitors and Wi-Fi in short supply
Returning employees are also straining Wi-Fi connections and internet network capacity, while some agencies are having trouble getting enough equipment and supplies because of a freeze on federal payment cards.
At a Bureau of Land Management office in the Mountain West, employees have been asked not to use video conferencing, according to a worker there.
"It's actually made it harder to be productive," the worker said, because their work involves supporting activities in the field and "the lack of video makes it hard to build a rapport."
At a different BLM site in the West, "we have to go to the agency head to ask if we can buy toilet paper" because the government-issued pay cards they'd normally use to buy it have been capped at $1, another BLM worker said. The BLM didn't respond to a request for comment.
At the FAA, IT workers are running low on monitors and other computer equipment and are unable to buy more, according to an FAA employee.
In a statement to NPR, the FAA said it is "committed to safely and efficiently bringing our employees back to in-person work to better uphold our core safety mission. We are working with employees to ensure they have the workspace needed as we go through this period of adjustment."
Adding to the confusion, some employees are being told the offices they're returning to may close, as the government weighs plans to dramatically shrink its real estate footprint.
A Treasury Department employee said they and their colleagues were asked if they would consider relocating "due to our office being closed after we have just been given the return to work order." The employee said it's not clear where that different location might be.
An employee at the Department of Health and Human Services who lives hundreds of miles away from the agency's Maryland headquarters is still waiting to find out where they will be instructed to work from as the April 28 return-to-office deadline approaches. They, like other remote HHS employees NPR spoke with, are concerned they will be asked to relocate to Maryland on short notice.
"If we have to up and move, that's something that we need to know," the HHS employee said.
HHS and Treasury Department officials didn't respond to requests for comment.
Until recently, the government encouraged many employees to work from home
The number of federal employees who work remotely or regularly telework increased significantly during the COVID pandemic. But many agencies have been shifting toward teleworking for decades, spurred by the desire to reduce office space costs and improve recruitment and retention, according to the federal Office of Personnel Management.
"Thoughtfully implemented alongside meaningful in-person work, telework has the potential to significantly enhance the agility, productivity, and engagement of our workforce. It has enabled the government to attract and retain diverse, top-quality talent from across the nation," OPM wrote in its annual report to Congress on telework last year.
Telework saved federal agencies more than $230 million in fiscal year 2023, OPM's survey found, led by reduced costs for commuting and transit, real estate and energy.
"Agencies are also reporting significant increases in cost savings in human capital (recruitment, retention, reduced turnover etc.)," OPM said.
The push to work remotely existed during the first Trump term. In its fiscal year 2019 report to Congress, OPM said that "agencies continue to make progress in their use of telework to deliver mission outcomes, provide excellent customer service, and efficient stewardship of our taxpayer dollars."
Many of the federal employees NPR spoke with said their agencies had experienced the benefits of working remotely.
"Telework wasn't just a nice to do thing, it was a necessity," said an Air Force employee who works at the Pentagon. Their unit doesn't have enough desks to accommodate everyone, a situation that predates COVID, they said. The Defense Department didn't respond to a request for comment.
"We have been a hybrid work force doing top-notch science for decades," one of the FDA employees said. "The physical difficulty and the psychological distraction of [return to office] will result in real attrition and lower productivity."
Remote workers say RTO order feels like an "arbitrary punishment"
For many civil servants who have been working remotely, the blanket order to return to an office that in some cases they never worked in feels like a misunderstanding of their jobs.
"They talk about the bloat in D.C. — we live in the states and communities that voted for this administration, and we represent those states and communities," the remote HHS employee said. "We bring expertise because we come from these communities."
Others say working in an office hasn't done anything to improve their work or efficiency. Instead they're carrying the added burden and expense of commuting every day — and creating more costs for the government, too, which has to pay for office space and utilities.
"Our calls are still virtual. Our work is still done through email, [Microsoft] Teams calls and SharePoint uploads," the IRS employee in Texas said. "My supervisor is in another state. My supervisor's supervisor is in a totally different state. We're not 'collaborating' any more than we were two weeks ago. The whole thing is absurd."
"I'm literally remote working from an office instead of at home," said a worker at U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services whose supervisor and colleagues are in different states. "I would be more receptive [to working in the office] if there was a tangible, coherent reason for doing so."
The return-to-office push feels to some federal workers in line with what they see as an effort to drive them to the point of quitting, at the same time agencies are planning large-scale job cuts at the direction of the Trump administration.
Several people NPR spoke with brought up a 2023 speech by Russell Vought, an architect of the Heritage Foundation's Project 2025 roadmap to pare back the government. He now heads the Office of Management and Budget and said in that speech: "We want the bureaucrats to be traumatically affected. When they wake up in the morning, we want them to not want to go to work because they are increasingly viewed as the villains."
"It has seemed like an arbitrary punishment to lower morale," one of the FDA workers in Maryland said.
Have information you want to share about the ongoing changes across the federal government? Reach out to these authors: Shannon Bond is available through encrypted communications on Signal at shannonbond.01, and Jenna McLaughlin is available at jennamclaughlin.54
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