Tom Temin
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The debt ceiling bill must traverse a tortured path to become law. Nothing's guaranteed quite yet. But presuming it becomes law, it will put defense and non-defense spending under caps in place, even with a military pay raise staying in place.
May 31, 2023 -
Among the troubling programs on the Government Accountability Office's High-Risk List, is the ability of the Health and Human Services Department to manage the national response to health emergencies. In the most recent pandemic, the response of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention was at best disjointed.
May 31, 2023 -
In today's Federal Newscast: Border Patrol Chief Raul Ortiz will end his 30-year career in 30 days. An Air Force disaster recovery response team is on its way to Guam. And the VA is pulling the mask off of certain mandates.
May 31, 2023 -
Deep in the weeds of agency management, you find something called the FITARA scorecard. FITARA stands for Federal Information Technology Acquisition Reform Act. It became law in 2015. Twice each year, agencies receive a scorecard from Congress on how they did managing their IT activities. Now a team, under the IT trade group ACT-IAC, has come up with a list of recommendations for revising the FITARA scorecard.
May 30, 2023 -
In theory there is a debt-ceiling deal between President Joe Biden and House Speaker Kevin McCarthy. But it is not law yet. With days until the theoretical deadline, Congress has a lot of work to do.
May 30, 2023 -
Low-risk investments generally have low returns. By law, the Postal Service must invest retiree assets in U.S. Treasury securities. The Office of Inspector General took a look at how much USPS would have had now, with a stock-and-bond mix.
May 30, 2023 -
In today's Federal Newscast: Political campaigns prove to be a minefield for Hatch Act violators. Agencies have expanded their cyber defenses. And the Navy says the Guam typhoon means you can check out anytime you'd like, but you can never leave; at least not until July.
May 30, 2023 -
On Memorial Day, we recall those who didn't return. The tragic pattern of those who return only to take their own lives, that's an ongoing challenge.
May 29, 2023 -
he BOP Mission Statement also references "custody and care, not jails and guards." Federal Drive with Tom Temin takes a look a look at one success. Eddie Ellis was convicted of manslaughter, did part of his sentence in the Florence, Colorado super-max prison, and returned to society. He now works for juvenile-sentencing reform. This is a personal, intimate, and instructive interview.
May 26, 2023 -
All week the Federal Drive has examined the Bureau of Prisons, which ranks as, "The Worst Place to Work in the Federal Government," according to the annual listing derived from employee viewpoint survey results and compiled by the Partnership for Public Service. To finish the series, Federal Drive host Tom Temin talks with Federal Bureau of Prisons Director Colette Peters, who has been on the job for almost a year
May 26, 2023 -
Bureau of Prisons path forward is not complicated, but it does go steeply up hill.
May 26, 2023 -
In today's Federal Newscast: President Biden nominates a replacement for outgoing Joint Chiefs Chairman Mark Milley. VA Nurses, numbering about 14,000, have reached an agreement with their union. And there's not quite a six-digit number of folks with seven-digit TSP accounts.
May 26, 2023 -
Treasury has a way to ensure continuity of Social Security benefits payments without the need to raise the debt ceiling
May 25, 2023 -
Waste, fraud and abuse in the federal student aid loan program is bad. But it would be a lot worse, if not for someone at the Government Accountability Office (GAO) For more than 20 years, she has dispensed tough and crucial oversight to federal financial aid for students, which has rooted out fraudsters and saved untold sums of money. Now she is a finalist for a Service to America Medals, administered by the Partnership for Public Service.
May 25, 2023 -
Now Tom Temin turns his attention toward a working senior officer specialist, who didn't have official permission to speak publicly, so we'll call him Officer X. His voice has been disguised to protect his anonymity and allow for a very candid discussion.
May 25, 2023