By Editor,Jon Michael Raasch

Copyright dailymail

Some Trump administration workers are sounding the alarm that their out-of-office emails were mysteriously altered to blame Democrats for the shutdown.

While government employees are furloughed and the federal shutdown remains ongoing, multiple Department of Education (DOE) employees are claiming their automatic email replies were edited to blame Democrats for the shutdown.

Their original out-of-office replies made no mention of Democrats or Republicans.

But now those replies place the blame for the lapse in government funding squarely on liberal senators.

And the employees are scrambling to find out why the phrasing changed.

‘Thank you for contacting me. On September 19, 2025, the House of Representatives passed H.R. 5371, a clean continuing resolution,’ some Education Department employees’ automatic emails read.

‘Unfortunately, Democratic Senators are blocking the passage of H.R. 5371 in the Senate which has led to a lapse in appropriations. Due to the lapse in appropriations I am currently in furlough status. I will respond to emails once government functions resume.’

The language change was first reported by journalist Marisa Kabas.

It is not clear who made the changes in the phrasing, but it is far different from the standard out-of-office language that the department suggested its employees use.

‘The Department unilaterally, and without staff knowledge or consent, went in and changed the messages to include partisan language,’ one DOE employee told Wired.

Another education official told NBC News: ‘None of us consented to this. And it’s written in the first-person, as if I’m the one conveying this message, and I’m not. I don’t agree with it. I don’t think it’s ethical or legal. I think it violates the Hatch Act.’

The Hatch Act limits the political activity that federal employees are allowed to engage in.

The Department of Education did not reply to the Daily Mail’s request for comment.

Ironically, when the Daily Mail reached out to the White House for comment, an automatic reply quickly came back stating that staffing levels are strained.

It also blamed the Democrats for the shutdown.

‘Due to staff shortages resulting from the Democrat Shutdown, the typical 24/7 monitoring of this press inbox may experience delays,’ the automatic reply from the White House stated.

‘As you await a response, please remember this could have been avoided if the Democrats voted for the clean Continuing Resolution to keep the government open,’ it continued.

White House spokeswoman Abigail Jackson told the Daily Mail in a subsequent email: ‘It’s an objective fact that Democrats are responsible for the government shutdown, the Trump Administration is simply sharing the truth with the American people.’

A White House official also reiterated to the Daily Mail that similar tactics were used during the Obama and Biden administrations.

‘The Biden and Obama administrations repeatedly assigned partisan blame on Republicans in official fact sheets, press releases and statements, as outlined by many examples,’ they said.

‘The Biden [Office of Special Counsel] found that you can send official communications referring to people by party.’

In September 2024, the U.S. Office of the Special Counsel ruled that Biden’s Secretary of Education Miguel Cardona did not violate the Hatch Act by sending an email to federal student loan borrowers referencing Republicans.

Other official communications from the Biden administration similarly made references to Republicans.

‘The law is intended to prohibit government officials from using their official authority to interfere with, or affect elections,’ Andrew Cherkasky, co-founder of Golden Law, told Fox News on Thursday.

‘The President of the United States and his agents under his authority have an unquestionable constitutional right to speak directly to the American people about what is happening in their government and who is responsible for it.