Sen. Joni Ernst has introduced the Where’s the Workforce At Listed by Duties and Office (Where’s WALDO) Act to force the Office of Personnel Management to publish a public directory of federal employees. The push follows a hard-hitting fiscal review that found rising pay, redacted names and a federal payroll ballooning faster than personnel counts. This article walks through the lawmaker’s proposal, the watchdog’s findings, key figures from the review, and the reactions from both the watchdog and OPM.
Ernst’s bill would require OPM to publish a searchable roster of federal workers so taxpayers can see who is on the public payroll and what they do. The directory would list each worker’s name, job title, description of duties, agency, primary duty station, annual pay including bonuses, and the date they started in the position. Ernst frames the measure as plain accountability for citizens who pay the bills.
The legislation follows a report from a conservative fiscal watchdog that cataloged federal salaries for fiscal year 2024 and highlighted several surprising trends. That analysis counted 2.9 million civil service employees with a total payroll of $270 billion, and it added roughly 30 percent in benefits to show the full cost. The watchdog also flagged large numbers of redactions that kept officials and contractors out of public view.
Ernst pushed the transparency angle with a memorable turn of phrase that stresses taxpayer frustration. “Like a twisted game of reverse Secret Santa, taxpayers are gifting paychecks to bureaucrats who remain anonymous,” said Ernst. “The American people should not be forced to play ‘Where’s Waldo’ when it comes to figuring out where federal workers are during the workday. I will be embracing the Christmas spirit by creating a list, that anyone can check twice, to clearly state where every federal employee is and how much they are being paid.”
The watchdog’s numbers show payroll climbing much faster than headcount since 2020, which is the core concern driving the bill. While overall employee numbers rose about 5 percent, payroll surged far more, sending the per-minute cost of the federal workforce into eye-popping territory. That watchdog calculated the workforce costs as $673,000 per minute, $40.4 million per hour and just under $1 billion per day.
The report dug into high-earners and redactions and turned up some stark specifics taxpayers should care about. It found almost 1,000 workers earning more than the president’s $400,000 salary and 31,452 non-War Department employees making more than every state governor. There were also 793,537 federal staff making $100,000 or more, with steep increases in those making $200,000 and $300,000 since 2020.
Investigators also discovered widespread masking of employee names and payments, a transparency problem the bill aims to fix. During the probe the watchdog found that names for 383,000 federal workers across 56 agencies were redacted, representing $38.3 billion in pay. This kind of blank space makes public oversight impossible and fuels the demand for a single, transparent directory.
John Hart, the watchdog’s CEO, underscored the practical need for routine disclosure and called out the blind spots the report uncovered. “Our investigators found far too many redactions and blind spots, including a vast ecosystem of contractors, that DOGE could have fixed. Accountability for taxpayers is impossible without real-time transparency. Making these disclosures a routine responsibility of OPM is an excellent step toward the real-time transparency our founders would have written into the Constitution had they been alive today.”
An OPM representative offered measured support for making federal workforce data clearer while protecting privacy. The spokesperson said the agency “is proud to support” Ernst’s new bill and called the suggestions “common sense.” “Transparency and accountability in the federal workforce are essential to maintaining public trust,” the spokesperson said. “Providing the public with clear, standardized information about federal positions, duties, and compensation while appropriately protecting employee privacy is an important part of good government.”
If enacted, the Where’s WALDO Act would cover both direct federal employees and contractors and would give OPM 18 months to deliver the directory. Backers see it as a commonsense reform that makes pay and duties visible to taxpayers, restores accountability and helps stop administrative bloat. For Republicans focused on limited government and stewardship of taxpayer dollars, it is a clear step toward smarter, more transparent federal management.
