Mike Johnson’s Pants on Fire claim that 1% of federal employees are ‘actually working in the office’

As high-profile businesspeople Elon Musk and Vivek Ramaswamy launched their Department of Government Efficiency — part of President-elect Donald Trump’s efforts to slash government spending — House Speaker Mike Johnson, R-La., cast the federal workforce as avoiding its duties.

"Well there was a report that came out today, I don't know if you all have seen it, but someone did a little survey about how many federal employees are actually working in the office," Johnson told reporters Dec. 5. "By one estimate, it may be about 1%, if you don't count the security personnel that are covering these buildings. … And so one of the first things that I think you'll see is a demand from the new administration, and from all of us in Congress, that federal workers return to their desks and get back to the work that they are supposed to be doing."

Johnson’s office did not respond to our inquiries. But his comments followed the Dec. 5 release of a report by Sen. Joni Ernst, R-Iowa, that criticized federal employees' working practices; it was titled, "Out of office: Bureaucrats on the beach and in bubble baths but not in office buildings." The report said 6% of federal workers "report in-person on a full-time basis, while nearly one-third are entirely remote." 

On the day of Johnson’s remarks, Musk posted on X to spotlight the New York Post’s coverage of Ernst’s report. In his post, Musk said, "If you exclude security guards & maintenance personnel, the number of government workers who show up in person and do 40 hours of work a week is closer to 1%!"

This 1% figure does not appear in Ernst’s report.

Ernst’s office also did not respond to inquiries. But her report drew from a survey by a news outlet that later clarified it was not a scientific survey and should not be used to draw conclusions about the federal workforce. 

Surveys by federal agencies have found vastly different figures. For example, the federal Office of Personnel Management, which handles the federal government’s human resources, found that about 14% of federal employees work remotely full-time. That study also found that 32% of federal workers never work remotely, meaning they work in the office five days a week.

Another study by the federal Office of Management and Budget, which helps craft presidential budget proposals and manage the executive branch, found that half of federal workers aren’t eligible to work remotely. Employees eligible for remote work average three days a week in the office, the study found.

The federal government employs more than 4 million people, including 2.28 million federal civilian employees.

Ernst’s report relies on government, media and whistleblower reports; her office did not undertake its own statistical research. 

Its headline finding — that 6% of federal workers report in-person on a full-time basis — cites a survey released in April by the Federal News Network, a news outlet that covers the federal workforce.

The survey gauged current federal employees’ perspectives on post-COVID-19 return-to-office changes at their agencies. It received 6,338 responses, which represents between 0.2% and 0.3% of the total federal workforce.

About 30% of respondents said they work entirely remotely, 6% said they work entirely in-person and 64% said they work a hybrid of in-office and remote.

However, on Dec. 6, one day after Ernst released her report citing the survey, Federal News Network appended an editor's note to its report, clarifying that the survey was "non-scientific." 

Federal News Network noted that respondents chose whether to participate in the survey, a process that survey experts say can create bias. Federal News Network Executive Editor Jason Miller told PolitiFact that the survey system didn’t prevent one person from answering the survey more than once.

"As we said in our story, the 6% number is a snapshot of federal employees who responded to our online survey," Miller said. "We don’t believe, nor have ever said, this data represents all federal employees."

Other federal workforce surveys contradict the Federal News Network’s findings.

The 2023 edition of an annual survey by the Office of Personnel Management asked federal workers about their telework practices. Invitations were sent to more than 1.6 million employees, of whom more than 625,568, or 39%, responded.

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Rand Paul

stated on November 7, 2010 in an interview on ABC's This Week with Christiane Amanpour

"The average federal employee makes $120,000 a year. The average private employee makes $60,000 a year."

About 46% said they rarely or never work remotely. Another 17% said they worked remotely one or two days a week. Fourteen percent said they were full-time remote workers.

The agency’s 2024 survey, which was released after Johnson’s remarks, did not ask telework questions. 

The Office of Management and Budget released another study on the federal workforce in August. It found that, as of May, about half of federal workers held jobs that did not allow for telework, such as positions that provide health care to veterans, inspect the food supply and manage federal natural lands. 

"At the same time, telework-eligible personnel spent approximately 60% of regular, working hours in-person at agency-assigned job sites," the report said, indicating federal workforce telework rates generally in line with the private sector, according to Congressional Budget Office data.

Ernst’s report cited the Office of Personnel Management and Office of Management and Budget reports. But it did not cite the overall telework data that conflicted with the Federal News Network survey.

The American Federation of Government Employees, a federal workforce labor union, criticized Ernst’s report and what it described as "misstatements" by lawmakers and members of Trump’s transition team. "Exaggerating the number of federal employees who telework and portraying those who do as failing to show up for work is a deliberate attempt to demean the federal workforce and justify the wholesale privatization of public-sector jobs," the union said in a Dec. 6 statement.

Johnson said about 1% of federal employees are "actually working in the office." 

He appeared to be citing Ernst’s report, which relied on a Federal News Network survey that produced a low figure of in-office employees but is not comprehensive. The outlet said it was not scientific and should not be used to draw conclusions about federal employees.

Conversely, the Office of Personnel Management found in 2023 that about 14% of federal employees work remotely full-time, and that 32% of federal workers never work remotely. The Office of Management and Budget found that half of federal workers aren’t eligible to work remotely, and that the half who are average three days a week in the office.

We rate the statement Pants on Fire.