By Timothy Gardner
WASHINGTON (Reuters) -The Trump administration next week will begin to furlough workers at the agency that manages the U.S. nuclear weapons arsenal due to the government shutdown, Energy Secretary Chris Wright said on Friday.
Wright said in a post on X that the furloughs will affect National Nuclear Security Administration workers who are “critical to modernizing our nuclear arsenal.”
The NNSA, a semi-autonomous branch of the Department of Energy, also works around the world to secure dangerous nuclear materials, including in Ukraine as the war with Russia continues. It has about 2,000 workers who oversee some 60,000 contractors maintaining and testing weapons at national laboratories and other locations across the U.S.
Wright told USA Today that starting next week there could be tens of thousands of layoffs of contractors along with furloughs of staff workers due to the shutdown, now on its 17th day.
A nuclear weapons control expert criticized the potential cuts.
“If the Trump administration really thinks the NNSA’s functions are important — and many of them are essential for nuclear facility safety and security — I am sure they can find the funds to keep the workers on the job, or else they might want to rethink their position on the federal government shutdown,” said Daryl Kimball, executive director of the Arms Control Association.
The agency will not furlough people working on emergency services, Wright told Bloomberg Surveillance on Friday. But he said the modernization of nuclear weapons program to replace older weapons could be affected.
“We’re just getting momentum there,” he said about the modernization program. “To have everybody unpaid and not coming to work, that will not be helpful.”
The costs of operating and modernizing America’s nuclear forces through 2034 are projected to soar to $946 billion, 25% higher than a 2023 estimate, a report by the non-partisan Congressional Budget Office said in April. Nuclear weapons expenditures are divided between the Pentagon and the NNSA.
(Reporting by Timothy GardnerEditing by Bill Berkrot)
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