Sponsors (24)
The bill aims to standardize and tighten federal telework policy—restoring predictable, oversight‑friendly practices and encouraging certified telework where cost‑effective and secure—at the cost of reduced employee flexibility, potential morale and operational disruption, and added administrative and compliance burdens.
Federal employees will have predictable, uniform telework expectations, restoring pre‑pandemic norms and reducing ambiguity about remote‑work eligibility and schedules.
Agencies and Congress will gain clearer, evidence‑based telework policies and standardized reporting, improving oversight, consistency across agencies, and the ability to align telework with mission performance.
Taxpayers and agencies could see reduced real property and facility costs if agencies adopt certified telework plans that allow less underused office space.
Many federal employees will lose expanded remote‑work flexibility gained since 2019, reducing work‑life balance and increasing commuting time and expenses for a large portion of the workforce.
A required rapid 30‑day implementation risks disrupting agency operations and employee morale by forcing quick returns to pre‑2019 schedules without transition time.
Certification requirements and reviews could delay telework expansions and slow workforce modernization while agencies wait for OPM approval.
Based on analysis of 3 sections of legislative text.
Requires executive agencies to limit telework to 2019 levels until OPM‑certified plans and studies show expansions improve mission performance and reduce costs without raising agency expenses.
Introduced January 16, 2025 by James Comer · Last progress January 16, 2025
Requires Executive agencies to limit telework and remote work to the same policies, practices, and levels that were in place on December 31, 2019, within 30 days of enactment, and bans any expansion until the agency submits a study and a telework expansion plan to Congress that is certified by the Director of the Office of Personnel Management (OPM). Agencies have up to six months to deliver a study of pandemic-era telework impacts, a plan to expand telework (if any), and an OPM certification that the plan will improve mission performance, reduce real property and locality‑pay costs, and ensure secure, productive remote work without substantially raising agency costs.