A growing number of Pennsylvania's members of Congress are saying they will not take a paycheck while the federal government is shut down, although most will not miss a paycheck unless the shutdown continues into November.
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A spokesman for the U.S House's chief administrative office said Monday that monthly paychecks for members are not due until the end of October, so no House member has missed a paycheck as a result of the federal government shutdown that began last week.
Senators, like many federal employees, are paid twice a month, with the next paycheck due around Oct. 15. Both of Pennsylvania Sens. Pat Toomey and Bob Casey have said they will not accept a paycheck during the shutdown.
More than half the members of Pennsylvania's 18-person U.S. House contingent say they have asked for their pay to be withheld, or will not accept a paycheck. Seven congressmen did not respond to inquiries Monday and the chief administrative office would not say whose pay it was asked to withhold.
Rank-and-file U.S. House and Senate members make $174,000 a year.
Lawmakers who asked for their paychecks to be withheld during a shutdown would still be issued all of their back pay by congressional administrators once the shutdown ends, and lawmakers were moving to ensure that hundreds of thousands of federal employees will be treated the same way.
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The House voted 407-0 on Saturday to reimburse federal workers for lost pay during the shutdown. Its fate is unclear in the Democrat-controlled Senate, though President Barack Obama supports the bill.
A large chunk of the 800,000 furloughed federal employees will soon be returning to work after Defense Secretary Chuck Hagel on Sunday ordered nearly all 350,000 furloughed Defense Department civilian employees back on the job.
Monday was the seventh day of a partial shutdown over House Republican attempts to scale back Obama's signature health care law as the price to keep the federal government open and running.
Only one member of Pennsylvania's congressional delegation, Rep. Charles Dent, an Allentown-area Republican, broke party ranks by voting against his party's leadership in the dispute.
