This story was reported and written by VPM News.
Virginia Gov. Glenn Youngkin offered support for President Donald Trump’s executive actions reclassifying Northern Virginia federal workers and ordering them back to the office.
Youngkin, who had been asked about this in the past, repeated the same broad positions of support for Trump’s policy, particularly the return to office.
“We would really, really, really have liked this to have been done in the last administration, but I'm thrilled that he's calling the workers back to the office,” said Youngkin in an interview Tuesday. “Part of the big challenges that we have had in Metro performance and the financial deficit that it's been running over and over and over again have been the fact that nobody's going to work in DC.”
The Washington Metropolitan Area Transit Authority has what it called a “massive” budget shortfall — $750 million for fiscal year 2025, which runs from July 1, 2024, until June 30. Around 40% of the Metro’s ridership is federal workers.
Both Youngkin and U.S. Sen. Mark Warner (D–Va.) had said workers should return to working in person.
State Sen. Scott Surovell (D–Fairfax), the Virginia Senate’s majority leader, said Youngkin was using Metro funding as “cover” for political purposes.
“There's a lot of other and better ways to help get Metro fixed, including funding it, or collaborating with us on finding permanent, long-term funding, a revenue source for it, which a lot of us have put a lot of hours in, while the governor just takes potshots at it,” said Surovell in an interview. “Nobody in the Republican Party wants to get sideways with Trump and Elon Musk and his bank account.”
Trump also reinstated an executive order that reclassified federal workers, enabling more direct political control over the bureaucracy.
“Any power they have is delegated by the President,” the order says of federal employees, "and they must be accountable to the President.”
Trump has also said he wanted to move 100,000 jobs out of the D.C. Metropolitan Area. About 150,000 federal workers live in Virginia, according to data from the Congressional Research Service. (Roughly 162,000 federal workers live in the District of Columbia.)
Youngkin said the policies could lead to the commonwealth losing federal jobs. He touted Virginia’s economic growth and suggested the state’s open jobs (295,000 as of November) as possible landing spots for laid-off federal workers.
“I do think that there will be efficiencies in the federal workforce over time, and Virginia may, in fact, see in those areas some overall job reductions,” he said. “From a big picture, I have really agreed with the president that the federal government is bloated and there are tremendous efficiencies to be gained, and I think that's what he's demanding.”
“I really wish we had a governor who would stand up for the people who live in our state, instead of making excuses for the president and saying, ‘Oh, there's plenty of jobs out there,’” said Surovell. “This is about people's jobs, their lives, their ability to support their families, and it's about the future of the Virginia economy.”
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