Federal union leader fights back against RTO jibes from Musk

• A union boss said Elon Musk is unfairly criticizing the federal workforce.
• Musk has pushed for RTO for federal workers, saying the status quo is "not fair."
• Randy Erwin, the union leader, said Musk is too dismissive of their contributions.

The head of a major union of federal employees says he doesn't think Elon Musk understands who federal workers are or what they do.

"I don't think he knows the first thing about federal government," Randy Erwin, the national president of the National Federation of Federal Employees, told Business Insider in an interview.

"Frankly, I don't think he cares," he added.

Erwin spoke to BI after President Donald Trump signed an executive order Monday mandating that federal government employees return to the office.

It gave effect to an idea long championed by Musk and his Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE).

Musk, appointed to head up the new enterprise, laid out a vision of an RTO mandate for federal workers in November.

In a joint Wall Street Journal op-ed with Vivek Ramaswamy, who has since exited DOGE, the pair outlined their plans to cut costs and downsize the federal government.

"Requiring federal employees to come to the office five days a week would result in a wave of voluntary terminations that we welcome," they wrote.

"If federal employees don't want to show up, American taxpayers shouldn't pay them for the Covid-era privilege of staying home."

On Tuesday, Musk wrote on X, the platform he owns, that "pretending to work while taking money from taxpayers is no longer acceptable."

In another post, he said the executive order was about "fairness."

He wrote: "It's not fair that most people have to come to work to build products or provide services while Federal Government employees get to stay home"

Erwin said the image of the work-shy civil servant was untrue.

"There's this myth that federal workers aren't coming to work," Erwin said, describing the talking point as "a bunch of political BS."

A report by the Office of Management and Budget last August said that most of the 2.3 million civilian workers employed by the federal government already work in person, with 54% on-site and 10% fully remote.

Erwin said he believes Musk views federal workers as "innovation-blocking bureaucrats."

"I've got 110,000 members, not a single one would fit that description," he said. "They're out there, spread across the country, providing valuable services to the American people."

"I don't think he [Musk] knows the first thing about the federal workforce, who they are, where they are, and the valuable services that they provide," Erwin added.

Erwin was joined by another union leader in condemning the RTO mandate — Everett Kelley, who leads AFGE, the largest federal employee's union of some 800,000 members.

In a statement, he described remote work as "a critical tool for federal agencies to maintain continuity of operations in emergencies, increase disaster preparedness, and improve efficiency."

Erwin told BI that home-working was part of the appeal of government jobs, which typically pay less than private-sector ones. Without it, it would be harder to retain talent, he said.

"When you can't make anywhere near what you could be making in the private sector, some family, flexible work policies become a very, very important thing," he said.