Kansas City’s 30,000 federal workers are back at their jobs, following the end of the longest government shutdown in U.S. history. While many were furloughed, others employees had to work without pay for more than six weeks.
Among them was Chandler McGinnis, who answers the Social Security Administration’s customer contact number, speaking to callers about their disability benefits, Social Security checks and more.
In an interview with the KCUR podcast Kansas City Today, McGinnis said callers were more stressed than normal during the shutdown. She reports that people were worried about being able to pay for their health care needs and feed their families.
“I spoke to a woman whose children were getting kicked off Medicaid and she was kicked off her food stamps,” McGinnis said. “She had no idea how to feed her family and she just cried on the phone with me.”
McGinnis said many of her coworkers were feeling the same way, whether they were furloughed or still working. Her colleagues still working on-site had to pay to commute and park in the office lot, despite not having any income. Some requested to be furloughed because they couldn’t afford the expenses.
Her coworkers set up pantries for people to take home food for themselves or their pets.
“Some of us have kids, some of us have animals,” McGinnis said. “If we can't feed ourselves, we can't feed our families.”
The following interview highlights have been condensed and edited for clarity.
Interview highlights
On working while federal employees were furloughed
Because I get to work from home due to my medical conditions, I felt like I had to be there for my friends that could not. I kind of had to just suck it up and just deal with the turmoils and tribulations of the day and just accept it, and work my hardest and do as best as I could.
And I actually got through like, 50, 55 calls on the days that my other friends weren't there. I tried to pick up as much slack as I could to try and keep our administration afloat.
On how the shutdown has affected Social Security recipients
Some of the calls are very, very hard, and that's a reason why I feel like we do not get paid enough and we do not get enough recognition because it is traumatizing sometimes, the things that I hear. When I spoke to a woman whose children were getting kicked off Medicaid, and she was kicked off her food stamps, and she had no idea how to feed her family and she just cried on the phone with me, I tried to give her as many resources as I could, pantries, you know, things that you can go and try and get.
But when I can't fix things, it starts to break me. Because I'm a fixer. I want to fix all the problems that people present me with when they call, and if I can't fix these, then what am I doing? And some of these I couldn't fix. And during the shutdown, we weren't allowed to do a handful of our procedures. And so it got really bad. People would call asking to do things and I would tell them, “Try again. Call us back when the shutdown's over.”
On why she decided to work for the federal government
I used to be a bartender and a server for a really long time. I did restaurant management also. And I don't know, there was something in me that said that I wasn't in the right spot. I didn't want to get people inebriated anymore, I wanted to serve. And I got this job and I want to be there for 30 years.
I adore what I do and I love helping our most susceptible population. I love helping our elders. I love helping our disabled and I love fixing problems, and that's what I do all day long. It makes me feel like I found my passion and I found my meaning.
On the Trump administration's attitude toward federal workers
To say it bluntly, federal employees are under attack. Every day I get an email, I get a shiver down my spine because I don't know if another buyout or another firing spree or something else is coming to end my career. And it's been really hard. It's been to the point where the career that I love and want to be at for 30 years, I want to walk away sometimes, because I don't know what's coming next and it's scary.
On how the shutdown affected workers emotionally
We all have our mental issues that we go through, but trying to convince myself that it's going to get better and just keep on keeping on when we've been trying, and everything that we have tried to fix gets stopped — it's been hard.
I'm at the teleservice center and there's a processing center that implements the things that I'm working on. Our communication between the two components has been severed. And so one of my worst calls was speaking with a gentleman who had been terminated from his Medicare last October.
And because we could not communicate with the processing center to get him reinstated, he had been denied his cancer treatment all year long and he was going to die. And I couldn't fix it because I can't get in touch with the processing center. So it was emotionally tearing me down. Because I want to fix it and I can't.
On how DOGE cuts and the shutdown affected Social Security
During the beginning of the administration, we had our reduction in force where we lost over 7,000 of our employees right off the bat, and it sent a ripple throughout our entire agency to where things just stopped working, started falling apart.
Claims that should take 30 to 60 days are now taking seven months, sometimes 11 months, and people would ask me, “Am I going to die before you ever decide on my claim?” I'm not the person that decides on their claim, but having to have that conversation with them is difficult because I don't have an answer.
And then during the shutdown, it was like a second blow, because the call log was up to about three or four hours to get a call back. And by the time I would reach them, they would just rip me a new one, because I didn't get to them quick enough. And how do I explain to you that there's only a third or fourth of us here, because most of us can't afford to be here, and so please, just be kind to those of us that showed up.
On working without pay for several weeks
The very first day, I had a little bit of a sour attitude about it, and I kind of took it out on a couple callers. My way that I take calls is, I'm overwhelmingly kind. I pour honey on people because I want them to know that they're safe and they can talk to me, and I'm going to fix what they want to do. The first day, I was not kind, as I usually am, because I was also flustered with the circumstances.
And so by day two, I had a conversation with myself where [I told myself], “This is not their fault. You are here to serve and you need to give them the best that you can.” And so from that point forward, I just tried my hardest to just let them understand that we're trying and we care and we want to fix and we want to help, but it was hard.
When all my collectors started reaching out, that was pretty hard because it made me have to think about getting another job. And I'm not saying, quit my job, I'm saying, work a second job. This was the first year that I didn't have to work two jobs being in the government. I finally got enough raises that I could support myself, but now I may have to go back and work part-time somewhere else.
On the long-term outlooks for Social Security
I'm concerned about the future for Social Security and my own future. In my personal opinion, it feels like they are dismantling Social Security from within. It feels like they are wanting to privatize it so that they can adjust how people receive their benefits.
Right now, you and I get our 35 years of earnings averaged out. That's what your retirement pay will be when you decide to retire. If they try and privatize it, it will be subject to the peaks and the valleys of the stock market.
And I have spoken to people who have had to come out of retirement because their 401k tanked from the stock market. That shouldn't happen to Social Security and we can't let it happen.
And then me, personally, yeah, I am scared. I do have fear. I have fear speaking. I have fear telling people what's going on, but I couldn't sit back and watch things fall apart.
If you’re a current or former federal worker and want to talk about your experiences, email nomin@kcur.org.
