WHITE PLAINS, N.Y. — A cap on federal income has prevented United States Secret Service agents from being paid for hundreds of hours of work on the presidential campaign trail, leaving many agents working overtime for free since as early as this spring during what has been a historically demanding election year for the agency.



The Secret Service is one of the only agencies in the government that routinely pays overtime. But the payments are part of a byzantine structure wherein agents can run up against caps on overtime per pay period or annually — as well a yearly federal cap of $160,300 that limits an agent's salary and overtime combined.

It’s the annual federal cap, officials say, that has posed a problem during this year’s election and become a subject of great ire and frustration inside the agency.

When overtime drives an agent's aggregate income past the $160,300 limit — no matter how early in the year — that agent may no longer earn paid overtime, even as they regularly work long past a 50-hour week, traveling around the clock with the candidates, their families, the Obamas, the Bidens, and the press.

Ask any agent on the campaign trail when they “maxed out” during the course of the year — or hit the federal limit — and they will be ready with an answer: May, April, March, or, for some of the most senior agents in the field, even earlier.

The result? Hundreds of agents working months of overtime for which they will never be paid.



“It’s been an incredible sacrifice,” Secret Service Director Joseph Clancy told USA Today of the demands on agents this year. (Clancy has no power over the federal salary limit, but did waive a $35,000 cap restricting overtime specifically. The measure did not affect maxed-out agents, but did draw attention the high demands of the election year.)

An effort to raise the federal salary cap by about $10,000 in both the House and the Senate — a measure that would alleviate the issue but do little to address the underlying problem in future election cycles — has so far seen little success.

Secret Service officials have struggled to find members of Congress to champion the bills. The Federal Law Enforcement Officers Association, a nonpartisan group representing federal agents, has also started to lobby officials in Washington.