President Donald Trump’s second term has thus far been a deluge of executive orders. They’ve largely ranged from bad to horrifying, but one always stuck out as primarily just weird and out-of-touch: A ban on remote work for the federal government. As it turns out, this one’s even worse than it seems — government offices simply don’t have the space for all their new in-person workers.
Traffic in DC crept to a standstill Monday as nearly 17,000 federal workers commuted in to the Washington Navy Yard, a complex with the infrastructure to support 4,400 cars. According to federal workers who spoke with NBC, traffic was worse than it had been in years in the city:
While there will be an influx of workers expected to work in person, there are only about 4,400 parking spaces available on base.
Base officials said they are working with local government to handle the increase in traffic. The base is also increasing the number of workers at their entrances but says employees should expect delays.
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A long line of cars formed outside the Washington Navy Yard’s entrance on Monday morning. A federal worker who had been going into the office before the executive order was issued said traffic was backed up considerably.
“This is amazing because I haven’t seen this much of a backup in about three years,” the worker said. “I hope people are ready for it. I hope they bring their patience with them.”
Trump’s hatred of remote work is informed on multiple axes. On one side, the man himself simply doesn’t believe remote workers actually do anything — in statements earlier this week, reported by Fortune, he said as much outright:
President Trump doubled down on this stance yesterday, saying, “I happen to be a believer that you have to go to work. I don’t think you can work from home.
“Nobody’s going to work from home, they’re going to be going out, they’re gonna play tennis, they’re gonna play golf. They’re gonna do a lot of things—they’re not working.”
He added, “It’s a rare person that’s going to work. You might work 10% of the time, maybe 20%, I don’t think you’re going to work a lot more than that.”
On another, the move is explicitly a means to make working for the federal government worse. The thinking is that if workers accustomed to working from home are forced to commute, they’ll quit instead — letting the government off the hook for their paychecks. Again from Fortune:
On top of the buyouts, another tactic to push staff to quit—advertised by DOGE boss Elon Musk and his former partner Vivek Ramaswamy—was to require them to come back to the office full-time.
Return-to-office mandates make little sense for most industries, as the employer suddenly has to bear costs for real estate, internet, and myriad other costs. Work-from-home passes theses costs onto the employee, who very often maintains — or exceeds — the same quality of work. Unfortunately, work-from-home appears to be Woke, so we can’t have it. Have fun in the traffic, feds.