Coast Guard to get paychecks amid shutdown
U.S. Coast Guard service members will receive paychecks during the government shutdown, Department of Homeland Security (DHS) Secretary Kristi Noem said Monday.
“President Trump did not want any of our military to go without pay as a result of Democrats’ political theater, and we at DHS worked out an innovative solution to make sure that didn’t happen,” Noem said on the social platform X.
The secretary added that members of the Coast Guard “will not miss a paycheck this week as they continue to carry out their critical homeland security and military missions.”
Noem did not specify what the “innovative solution” was. When reached for comment regarding further details, DHS directed The Hill to the secretary’s initial statement.
The Coast Guard is overseen by DHS in times of peace. Members of the branch, along with the rest of the military, are scheduled to receive a paycheck Wednesday.
During government shutdowns, however, federal workers are typically not paid. On Saturday, President Trump directed Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth to utilize “all available funds” to ensure service members are paid this week.
A Defense Department official told The Hill on Saturday the department identified “approximately $8 billion of unobligated research testing and evaluation funds (RDTE) from the prior fiscal year that will be used to issue mid-month paychecks to service members in the event the funding lapse continues past Oct. 15.”
Last week, 10 House Democrats asked Speaker Mike Johnson (R-La.) to bring the chamber back to pass a bill ensuring service members are paid during the shutdown. Johnson, though, said that he would do not so and called on Democrats to pack the GOP’s “clean” continuing resolution (CR).
Rep. Ken Calvert (R-Calif.), the chair of the House Defense Appropriations Committee, told The Hill on Thursday that Democrats should back the CR.
“We can have policy and political fights in Congress, but we simply can’t ask service members to put themselves in harm’s way without paying them,” Calvert said. “It should be a red line for anyone who cares about our national security and our troops.”