OPM sees increase in federal retirement claims processing time
OPM reported that during July, it took the agency 59 days, on average, to process a federal employee’s retirement package from start to finish.
August 7, 2025 12:14 pm
< a min read
Federal employees submitting their retirement paperwork may have to wait longer to get their claims processed. The Office of Personnel Management reported that during July, it took the agency 59 days, on average, to process a federal employee’s retirement package from start to finish. That’s two weeks longer, on average, than it took OPM to work through cases in June. Another 8,300 federal employees sent their retirement paperwork to OPM last month. All combined, that adds up to nearly 37,000 feds who have submitted a retirement claim since April. Immigration and Customs Enforcement will start recruiting agents as young as 18 years old. Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem announced on Wednesday that she was removing the agency’s age limits for hiring. Prior to the change, ICE applicants usually had to be between 21 and 40 years old, depending on the position they applied for. The recruitment update comes as ICE continues with mass deportations at the direction of the Trump administration. The Justice Department has put new hiring rules in place for contractors, grantees and other recipients of federal funding. DoJ’s updated guidance from late last month said recipients of federal funding must continue to comply with anti-discrimination requirements, but cannot give preferential treatment to individuals or groups based on protected characteristics in a way that disadvantages other qualified persons. Justice warned that these or other unlawful practices could result in the loss of grant funding and the possibility the organization could be held liable under federal anti-discrimination laws.]]>
The General Services Administration struck a new enterprisewide deal for ChatGPT and it will only cost one dollar. A day after adding Open AI’s ChatGPT to the schedules program, GSA is offering agencies access to the artificial intelligence tools for barely any cost. GSA says under this enterprisewide deal, agencies can pay just one dollar to use ChatGPT Enterprise for one year. For an additional 60-day period, GSA says OpenAI will provide unlimited use of advanced models. Additionally, agencies will be able to get education and training tools for how best to apply ChatGPT’s capabilities. Similar deals could be on the way as Federal Acquisition Service Commissioner Josh Gruenbaum is encouraging other American AI technology companies to follow OpenAI’s lead. Another federal court has found fault with spending cuts directed by the Department of Government Efficiency, saying a Trump administration plan to cancel grants by the National Endowment for the Humanities is likely unconstitutional. Judge Michael Simon issued a temporary restraining order blocking the mass cancellation on Wednesday, finding the cancellation of appropriated funds violated the constitutional separation of powers and Congress’ power of the purse. The lawsuit was brought by a coalition of state and local humanities councils. Registration is open for senior-level employees who want to take executive development training. The Office of Personnel Management is encouraging federal employees to sign up, after the agency launched a new leadership training series this week. OPM says the training modules align with the new Executive Core Qualifications, or ECQs, that the Trump administration updated this year. OPM’s executive development programs are reserved for Senior Executive Service members and feds at levels 14 and 15 on the General Schedule.The Federal Communications Commission is going after technology certification bodies with potentially risky foreign ties. In a final rule released this week, the FCC is requiring telecommunication certification bodies, test labs and laboratory accreditation bodies to certify that they aren’t owned or controlled by foreign adversaries, including the Chinese government. The FCC said it will revoke any recognition of bodies that don’t meet the certification standards. The rule comes after FCC Chairman Brendan Carr ordered a review of the Cyber Trust Mark program over what he called potentially concerning ties to the government of China.The National Institute of Standards and Technology is taking on the cybersecurity implications of artificial intelligence. NIST is hosting a series of workshops this month to flesh out a preliminary draft of its cyber AI profile. So far, NIST’s Katerina Megas said there has been a clear message from cyber practitioners: “Please do not reinvent the wheel. Cybersecurity professionals are already crushed under so much guidance,” she said. “We don’t need yet another thing that we need to bring in and start looking at brand new and training people up on.” The goal of NIST’s project is to help cybersecurity leaders understand how to apply the agency’s existing guidance to the multifaceted world of AI and security.
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