Copyright startribune
As the federal government shutdown rolls toward the one-month mark, TSA agent Neal Gosman is steaming as his plan to pay down debt and help his 31 grandchildren is on hold. Gosman and nearly 600 other Transportation Security Administration workers at airports across Minnesota and the Dakotas are considered essential workers. That means they must clock in and do their jobs for no pay. The shutdown adds to anxiety many Minnesota federal workers have felt since President Donald Trump took office and the so-called Department of Government Efficiency starting cutting jobs. As they try to figure out how to pay their bills, they also wonder if they will have a job to come back to if the shutdown ever ends. “It makes us crabby in general not to get a paycheck. There is resentment building,” said Gosman, 78. The Metropolitan Airports Commission set up a food shelf last week in Terminal 1 and asked the public for donations. The union is setting up a second food shelf. Some of Gosman’s co-workers are picking up gig work as Uber and Lyft drivers. Other workers, some furloughed and some working without pay, are working as substitute teachers, trying to put off some bills and canceling vacations. They worry about paying off student loans and buying food, said Gosman, who makes $50,000 to $60,000 a year screening passengers and bags at security checkpoints. Congress is at an impasse as Democrats refuse to vote to end the shutdown unless health care subsidies — which expire at the end of the year and were cut in the federal budget bill — are reinstated. Republicans say they will debate that issue, but only after the shutdown ends.
