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Vermont’s Department of Labor will offer essential federal employees unemployment insurance amid the longest government shutdown in United States history.

Employees would have to pay the money back once the shutdown concludes and they receive back pay that is legally owed to them.

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California Gov. Gavin Newsom announced last week that the country’s largest state would be offering unemployment to federal workers required to stay on the job without pay. That contradicted a federal directive that states can’t make unemployment available to those workers.

Gov. Phil Scott’s administration put out a statement Tuesday morning announcing that it too was moving forward with making unemployment insurance available to all federal workers.

“There are Vermonters who have been showing up to work every day, but not getting a paycheck, for more than a month,” Labor Commissioner Lindsay Kurrle said in the statement.

“There is no end in sight for Federal shutdown and the Governor and legislators have asked us to help these individuals feed their families, pay their bills, and put gas in their cars,” she added.

Senate leader Tim Ashe, D/P-Chittenden, said during a morning meeting with reporters that his understanding, after conversations with administration officials, is that up to 1,500 Vermonters are among the federal workers who have been required to keep working through the shutdown.

“It would be like 0 percent loan until such time that they get their back pay,” he said, noting that not all eligible workers will apply for the temporary benefits.

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Ashe said legislators were also discussing how to ensure that Vermonters who rely on federal benefits for food, farming and living expenses are not cut off as a result of the shutdown.

The Legislature’s Joint Fiscal Office has said that federal funds for programs like food assistance might run out if the shutdown continues into March.

“So we’ll be looking to see if there if there are tools we have available to make sure that there’s no lag,” he said.

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