The SHOW UP Act of 2025 aims to restore in-person work at federal agencies to pre-pandemic levels and restrict telework unless agencies undergo a structured review and obtain certification from the Director of the Office of Personnel Management (OPM). Within 30 days of enactment, agencies would have to revert telework policies to the 2019 baseline (no expansion beyond that level). A detailed study and plan process would follow (due within 6 months) to assess the effects of expanded telework during the pandemic, including mission performance, costs related to real property and locality pay, security and data access, and workforce dispersal. Any plan to expand telework beyond 2019 levels could only be implemented if the Director certifies that the plan would improve mission performance and customer service, reduce property and locality-pay costs, and provide secure, productive teleworking for employees without increasing overall costs. If the initial plan isn’t certified, agencies may submit revised plans until certification is granted. In short, the bill seeks to revert to pre-pandemic telework norms, attach a rigorous congressional review process to any expansion beyond those norms, and tie certifications to demonstrable improvements in performance, costs, security, and nationwide employee dispersal.
Key Points
- 1Reinstatement to pre-pandemic telework levels: Within 30 days after enactment, each federal executive agency must adopt telework policies and practices that are equivalent to those in effect on December 31, 2019; no expansion beyond that level is allowed until a congressionally submitted plan is certified.
- 2Plan and certification requirement: The head of each agency, with the Director of OPM, must submit a plan to expand telework beyond the 2019 levels, along with a certification by the Director that the plan will have substantial positive effects on mission performance, customer service, geographic dispersal, and will lower real-property and locality-pay costs, while ensuring teleworkers have secure access and necessary equipment without raising overall costs.
- 3Study mandate: Within 6 months, agencies must produce a study analyzing the impacts of expanded telework during the SARS-CoV-2 pandemic, including effects on mission performance and customer service, real-property costs, security capacity, data access, and workforce dispersal, plus any other relevant impacts.
- 4Conditions and enforcement: An agency may not implement any expansion plan without the Director’s certification. If a plan is not certified on the first submission, agencies may submit revised plans until a certification is issued, and then submit those to Congress.
- 5Definitions and scope: The bill defines agencies (excluding GAO), the Director (OPM), locality pay (under 5 U.S.C. 5304/5304a), and telework/remote work as per the relevant statutory definitions.