Hundreds of federal employees, union members and other workforce advocates gathered in front of the U.S. Capitol building Wednesday afternoon to urge the passage of legislation that would restore their collective bargaining rights.

After the Protect America’s Workforce Act cleared the House in December, federal unions have been pushing over the last several weeks for the Senate to take up the bill’s companion legislation.

The bill, if enacted, would restore collective bargaining for an estimated two-thirds of the federal workforce. In effect, it would reverse two executive orders President Donald Trump signed last year that called on most executive branch agencies to terminate their federal union contracts on the grounds of “national security.”

“It’s about ensuring federal workers are treated with dignity and respect. Collective bargaining rights ensure our jobs and protect frontline workers whose voice in the service matters, and it needs to be heard,” Terry Scott, national executive vice president of the National Treasury Employees Union and longtime IRS revenue officer, said at the union rally Wednesday. “It’s a path towards accountability in government. It’s a path towards ensuring that the civil service recruits and retains top talent to keep America moving.”

In December, House lawmakers voted 231-195 to pass the Protect America’s Workforce Act. The entire Democratic Caucus, along with 20 Republicans, voted in favor of the legislation. The bill’s passage came after a discharge petition reached the required signature threshold to force a House floor vote.

The Senate companion bill, first introduced in September and led by Sens. Mark Warner (D-Va.) and Chris Van Hollen (D-Md.), has gained the support of the entire Democratic Caucus. Two Republicans, Sens. Lisa Murkowski (R-Alaska) and Susan Collins (R-Maine), are also co-sponsors of the bill.

At Wednesday’s federal union rally, Van Hollen criticized the president’s broad move to strip collective bargaining rights from federal employees at a majority of agencies.

“This was just a sham and a farce to deny patriotic federal employees the opportunity to participate in a union, to protect their rights,” Van Hollen said. “By protecting the federal workforce, we also protect the American people and the good work that you do on behalf of the American people.”

In March 2025, Trump ordered most agencies to cancel their contracts with federal unions, on the grounds that those agencies work primarily in national security. The president signed a second executive order last August, expanding the number of agencies instructed to bar federal unions from bargaining on behalf of employees.

Randy Erwin, national president of the National Federation of Federal Employees, said Trump’s action “blatantly violates the law.”

“It is by far the biggest attack that we have ever seen on collective bargaining rights in the history of this country. We cannot allow it to continue,” Erwin said Wednesday at the rally. “Unions have been bargaining in the federal sector since the Kennedy administration, and there are no examples of that compromising our national security.”

In addition to the legislation, multiple federal unions have sued the Trump administration over the pair of executive orders. One lawsuit from the American Federation of Government Employees argues that the administration took an overly broad interpretation of agencies that work primarily in national security, and that many of the agencies impacted by Trump’s orders have nothing to do with national security.

Following AFGE’s lawsuit, a federal judge last April blocked the administration from enforcing the executive order. After an appeals court later overturned that decision, several agencies moved forward with “de-recognizing” their unions and rescinding collective bargaining agreements.

As a result, recent federal workforce data shows that a significant percentage of federal employees has lost the ability to join a bargaining unit over the last year. Governmentwide, bargaining unit eligibility has dropped 18%, from 56% to 38%, according to data from the Office of Personnel Management.

At the same time, there has been a 20% increase in ineligibility for union representation. About half of the federal workforce is currently not eligible to join a bargaining unit. Another 12% of federal employees are eligible for union representation, but have not officially joined a bargaining unit.

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Congressional appropriators are seeking less aggressive budget cuts for the IRS than what the Trump administration has proposed.

Members of the House and Senate appropriations committees, in the latest package of spending bills for fiscal 2026, are also renewing efforts to shrink federal office space.

Funding for the State Department remains relatively unchanged, despite a massive reorganization carried out last year.

Meanwhile, lawmakers want agencies to use artificial intelligence tools to speed up the delivery of public-facing benefits and services.

Here are a few highlights from the FY 2026 spending bills on Financial Services and General Government, as well as National Security and the State Department.

Less dramatic cuts for the IRS

The spending package still includes budget cuts for the IRS, but less severe cuts than what the Trump administration and House Republicans proposed.

The minibus would give the IRS an $11.2 billion budget for the rest of fiscal 2026 — a $1.1 billion, or nearly 9% cut from current spending levels. This would be the fourth consecutive year the IRS has seen spending cuts or a flat budget.

Republican appropriators said the spending package “restrains the IRS,” while investing more funds in public-facing taxpayer services.

IRS would spend $3 billion on taxpayer services — about $256 million above current spending levels. But its enforcement budget would shrink to $5 billion — about a $439 million cut compared to current levels.

The Trump administration proposed a $9.8 billion annual budget for the agency — more than a 20% spending cut from current spending levels.

In recent years, the IRS has tapped into a multi-billion-dollar modernization fund from the Inflation Reduction Act to address shrinking annual appropriations. Moving around these funds, however, leaves the IRS with less funding to address long-standing problems with its outdated IT systems.

Democrats on the appropriations committee said the spending deal rejects “poison pill” provisions from earlier proposals. That includes a provision that would block the IRS from creating its own free tax filing software.

The IRS officially shut down Direct File, the agency’s free online tax filing platform that ran for two years, and is exploring alternatives operated by tax preparation companies. The spending bill grants the IRS authority to make new hires more quickly to help address backlogged tax returns.

Under this spending deal, the Small Business Administration would also receive a $1.25 billion budget under this spending deal, rejecting the Trump administration’s plan to cut its funding by over 40%.

GSA funding to offload underutilized office space

Lawmakers are calling on the General Services Administration to accelerate its plans to offload underutilized federal office space. The spending deal, however, falls short of what GSA officials have said is necessary to address a multi-billion-dollar maintenance backlog.

The spending bill allows GSA to spend $9.7 billion from the Federal Buildings Fund. That fund includes rent payments GSA collects from agencies working out of GSA-owned facilities. Included in those funds, GSA receives $166 million in funding for new federal construction projects, and $934 million for federal building repairs.

In a joint explanatory statement, appropriators wrote that they are concerned that deferred maintenance costs for federal real estate are “rising at an unsustainable rate.”

The spending deal would require GSA to conduct a study examining the “administrative and regulatory burdens” GSA faces in the real estate disposal process, and to brief the appropriations committees on its findings.

GSA currently has about $24 billion in deferred maintenance projects. Ed Forst, GSA’s newly confirmed administrator, recently told a Senate panel that about $6 billion is “urgently needed” within the next year or two to address the deferred maintenance backlog. The maintenance backlog, he added, is “likely underestimated,” and will only grow if left unaddressed.

The Public Buildings Reform Board, which advises GSA on underutilized federal properties it should sell or offload, recently told a House subcommittee that GSA will need about $50 billion to address a backlog of deferred maintenance and repairs in federal buildings.

GSA currently receives about $600 million annually to address those needs. Given those spending levels, the board estimates GSA’s portfolio would have to shrink by about 80% to keep up with its maintenance backlog.

The spending deal would give $3.6 million to the Public Buildings Reform Board. The board is set to disband by the end of this year. Members of the board, however, say their work is far from finished, and have asked Congress to consider reauthorizing the board.

The spending bill also supports President Donald Trump’s executive order designating classical architectural styles as the preferred style for new construction projects.

AI tools to deliver public-facing services

The spending bill also focused on GSA’s government IT portfolio, and directs GSA to help deliver benefits and services to the public more quickly through AI tools.

The spending bill awards $1.4 million to GSA’s Office of Technology Policy to make federal websites more accessible for people with disabilities, as required by Section 508 of the 1973 Rehabilitation Act.

“As the nation’s population ages, there will be more people with disabilities who rely on accessibility tools to access government resources. This underscores the importance of making Federal websites, apps, kiosks, and other technology accessible in the coming decades,” the joint explanatory statement states.

More than half of all federal websites have at least one accessibility issue, according to data collected in 2024 by GSA and the Office of Management and Budget.

The spending package also directs GSA to help agencies improve their public-facing benefits and services through AI tools. The spending deal, however, doesn’t put any funding behind this goal.

“Congress recognizes the importance of improving customer satisfaction for constituents seeking information about benefits and government resources,” appropriators wrote in their joint explanatory statement. “The agreement encourages the GSA to work with federal agencies to develop improved customer experiences when interfacing with their government on its progress toward issuing this guidance.”

State Department funding intact, spares independent agencies from elimination 

Lawmakers are proposing modest budget cuts for the State Department, despite going through its largest reorganization in decades.

The minibus gives the State Department a $9.7 billion operating budget, an essentially flat budget compared to the department’s current $9.8 billion operations budget.

The minibus requires the State Department to give Congress quarterly updates on staffing levels, hiring and attrition for its civil service and Foreign Service ranks. The State Department laid off nearly 1,350 employees last summer. It also eliminated or consolidated hundreds of offices and programs.

The bill also rejects the Trump administration’s deep cuts planned for some independent agencies — including the Millennium Challenge Corporation and the U.S. Agency for Global Media, which includes Voice of America. But it doesn’t address the Trump administration’s dismantling of the U.S. Agency for International Development last year. All USAID programs spared from elimination have been folded into the State Department.

Senate Appropriations Committee Vice Chairwoman Patty Murray (D-Wash.) said the spending package reflects “tough negotiations under extremely challenging circumstances,” but is a “significantly better outcome than another yearlong continuing resolution.”

Senate Appropriations Committee Chairwoman Susan Collins (R-Maine) said the “appropriations process continues to move forward and advance priorities of the American people.”

House Appropriations Committee Ranking Member Rosa DeLauro (D-Conn.) said the minibus rejects “extreme cuts to humanitarian aid programs.”

House Appropriations Committee Chairman Tom Cole (R-Okla.) said that with this spending package, lawmakers “are advancing President Trump’s vision of a golden age defined by security, responsibility, and growth.”

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Congressional appropriators are rejecting some of the most severe agency budget cuts proposed by the Trump administration, and are looking to put additional guardrails on unilateral agency reorganizations that could further shrink the federal workforce.

A “minibus” of three spending bills for fiscal 2026, released by the House and Senate appropriations committees on Monday, prohibits covered agencies from using congressional funds to carry out most agency reorganization activities until they provide advanced notice to appropriators. Those activities include unilaterally reprogramming funds to create or eliminate programs, projects or activities, relocate any office or employees, or cut more than 5% of the employees or funding that support a program, project or activity.

It also prohibits agencies from carrying out these reorganizations using “general savings,” including savings from a reduction in personnel, “which would result in a change in existing programs, projects, or activities as approved by Congress.”

This language applies to a wide swath of agencies — including the departments of Justice, Interior, Commerce and Energy, as well as the Environmental Protection Agency, the National Science Foundation and NASA.

The spending package also includes language ensuring that the National Weather Service, the Bureau of Land Management, the Fish and Wildlife Service, the Forest Service and the EPA maintain staffing levels that allow them to carry out their statutory obligations.

Democrats on the appropriations committees said the spending deal reasserts Congress’s power of the purse, and seeks to rein in the Trump administration’s repurposing of agency budgets and unilateral agency reorganizations.

The Government Accountability Office found last year that several agencies unlawfully withheld congressional appropriations last year through a process called impoundment. GAO is still reviewing dozens of cases of potential impoundment.

Republican appropriators said the spending deal reflects “current fiscal constraints,” and trims the budgets of the Interior Department, EPA and the Forest Service to reflect recent staffing cuts.

The Trump administration sought to lay off about 4,000 federal employees during the recent government shutdown. Office of Management and Budget Director Russ Vought said last October that layoffs at these agencies were justified because lawmakers allowed funds for these programs to expire, indicating they were no longer congressional priorities.

A stopgap spending bill, set to expire on Jan. 30, has put a hold on layoffs at some agencies. The Interior Department was poised to eliminate more than 2,000 positions.

Steep cuts at other agencies, however, have already gone into effect. A recent inspector general report found that the Energy Department lost about 20% of its employees in fiscal 2025 through a combination of voluntary separation incentives, retirements and “other human resource actions.”

The National Park Service and the EPA have also lost about 25% of their workforce under the Trump administration.

The minibus spending package generally seeks modest spending reductions for covered agencies, but departs from the Trump administration’s calls for major budget cuts.  It would cut the EPA’s budget by about 4% in fiscal 2026 — a far cry from the 55% budget cut the Trump administration proposed.

Lawmakers are also proposing a nearly 4% budget cut for the National Science Foundation, rejecting the Trump administration’s request to cut NSF’s budget by about 57% in FY 2026.

The minibus offers a $24.43 billion budget for NASA, a nearly 2% decrease from current spending levels. But the package rejects most of the Trump administration’s proposals to cut NASA’s science budget by nearly half and terminate 55 operating and planned missions.

Lawmakers are seeking a $160 million budget increase for the Energy Department’s Office of Science — about a 2% boost from current spending levels, rejecting the Trump administration’s calls to cut more than $1 billion from its current budget. DOE’s Office of Science supports research being conducted by 22,000 researchers at 17 national labs and over 300 universities.

Lawmakers are proposing a $3.27 billion budget for the National Park Service, about a 2% overall budget decrease. The spending plan includes flat funding for National Park Service operations. The Trump administration proposed cutting the NPS operating budget by nearly $1 billion.

The National Parks Conservation Association said in a statement that the bill includes key provisions “seeking to retain and rehire urgently needed Park Service staff, which would help restore the agency’s capacity to protect our parks, as well as require congressional notification of any plans for future mass firings.”

NPCA President and CEO Theresa Pierno said that the association had been “sounding the alarm on the need for park funding and staffing for months, and Congress listened.”

Senate Appropriations Committee Vice Chairwoman Patty Murray (D-Wash.) said in a statement that Democrats, as part of these negotiations, “defeated heartless cuts,” and are reasserting congressional control of how agencies spend appropriated funds.

Murray said language in the minibus bill prevents President Donald Trump and cabinet secretaries from “unilaterally” deciding how to spend taxpayer dollars. A yearlong continuing resolution for fiscal 2025, she added, lacked these detailed funding directives for hundreds of programs, and “turned over decision-making power to the executive branch to fill in the gaps itself.”

“Importantly, passing these bills will help ensure that Congress, not President Trump and Russ Vought, decides how taxpayer dollars are spent — by once again providing hundreds of detailed spending directives and reasserting congressional control over these incredibly important spending decisions,” Murray said.

Sen. Chris Van Hollen (D-Md.), ranking member of the committee’s subcommittee on commerce, justice, science and related agencies, said the spending package rejects the Trump administration’s deep cuts to scientific agencies, including NASA Goddard, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration and the National Institute of Standards and Technology. All three agencies are based in Maryland.

“Our bill makes clear that Congress, on a bipartisan basis, will not accept this administration’s reckless, harmful cuts,” Van Hollen said in a statement.

Van Hollen said the bill “is not perfect,” but requires the Trump administration to provide more details on plans to relocate the FBI’s headquarters to the Reagan Building in downtown Washington, D.C., before it can tap into funds Congress had set aside for the project.

Before it taps into those funds, the FBI must give congressional appropriators an architectural and engineering plan for the new headquarters building.

“This is an important step to reassert Congress’s oversight role in the relocation of the FBI headquarters and to ensure the new headquarters meets the mission and security needs of the FBI,” Van Hollen said.

Committee Chairwoman Susan Collins (R-Maine) called the minibus a “fiscally responsible package that restrains spending while providing essential federal investments” in water infrastructure, energy and national security, and scientific research.

“The package supports our law enforcement and provides funding for national weather forecasting and oceans and fisheries science to save lives and livelihoods,” she said. “It provides investments in our public lands and upholds our commitments to tribal communities.”

House Appropriations Committee Chairman Tom Cole (R-Okla.) said the bipartisan spending package “reflects steady progress toward completing FY26 funding responsibly.”

House Appropriations Committee Ranking Member Rosa DeLauro (D-Conn.) said the spending package “reasserts Congress’s power of the purse.”

“Rather than another short-sighted stop-gap measure that affords the Trump Administration broader discretion, this full-year funding package restrains the White House through precise, legally binding spending requirements,” DeLauro said.

Congress has already passed FY 2026 spending bills that cover the Department of Agriculture and the Department of Veterans Affairs, military construction and the legislative branch.

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