The agency that maintains the US nuclear arsenal will be sending home 80% of its workforce as the government shutdown drags through its 17th day and into the weekend, now the longest full funding lapse in US history.
House armed services committee chair Mike Rogers said in a Friday press conference that the National Nuclear Security Administration has now exhausted its carryover reserves.
“We were just informed last night that the National Nuclear Security Administration, the group that manages our nuclear stockpile, that the carryover funding they’ve been using is about to run out,” said Rogers, a Republican from Alabama. “These are not employees that you want to go home. They’re managing and handling a very important strategic asset for us.”
The NNSA, which operates as part of the department of energy, does not directly control operational nuclear weapons – a Pentagon responsibility – but plays a strategic role in keeping warheads secure and functional without conducting explosive tests. The agency also runs non-proliferation programs aimed at preventing nuclear materials from reaching hostile nations or terrorist organizations.
Around 1,400 NNSA employees will be furloughed without pay starting on Monday, leaving only 375 staff members designated as essential to continue working, according to an agency notice obtained by Politico. A department of energy spokesperson confirmed the approximate workforce numbers.
The spokesperson also said that NNSA’s office of secure transportation, which is responsible for transporting government-owned nuclear material across the country, is funded through 27 October, and added that Chris Wright, the energy secretary, will be at the NNSA site in Las Vegas on Monday to “further discuss the impacts of the shutdown on America’s nuclear deterrent”.
Under the agency’s 2025 contingency protocols in the event of a shutdown, the skeleton crew on duty will focus exclusively on hyperspecific safety operations: monitoring nuclear materials, maintaining unique equipment, ensuring reactor safety for navy vessels, and continuing international nonproliferation work it deems essential for security.
But most scientific research, stockpile maintenance, and global security programs will be suspended, potentially creating delays in sensitive national defense projects that need rigid and consistent oversight.
The current impasse has now become the longest complete government-wide shutdown in US history, surpassing a 16-day funding lapse in 2013. Previous lengthier shutdowns affected only portions of the federal government.
Speaker Mike Johnson blamed Senate Democrats for the crisis, saying earlier this week the country is “barreling toward one of the longest shutdowns in American history, unless Democrats drop their demands”. Republican leaders are also now worried about potential airport disruptions during the upcoming Thanksgiving travel period if the stalemate continues.
Hundreds of thousands of federal employees, including congressional and agency staffers, remain either furloughed or working without pay.
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