A bed bug infestation at an Agriculture Department building is riling agency staff, reigniting frustrations over remote work policy and making at least some employees sick.

The bugs were found in the building that houses the Animal and Plant Inspection Service, the agency responsible for containing and mitigating the spread of invasive pests in the U.S. The irony, one USDA employee said, “was lost on no one.”

The George Washington Carver Center in Beltsville, Maryland, first notified employees of the situation in mid-May, according to five employees familiar with the matter and a transcript of a town hall meeting obtained by NOTUS. The department opted to send employees home and allow them to telework for a few days to fumigate the building.

When employees returned, however, they complained of noxious fumes and resulting sickness, and USDA once again authorized them to work remotely. The telework approval was a rare exception to the Trump administration’s push to require all federal workers to report to their normal workplaces five days per week.

On Friday, USDA officials notified employees that bed bugs were again observed in the building. This time around, three employees said, the department has not authorized any additional telework. Instead, department leadership told employees to take personal vacation time if they did not want to report to the office.

Employees at two USDA agencies, APHIS and the Agricultural Research Service, report to the GWC campus. The bugs were found specifically in the building that houses APHIS, though USDA fumigated the entire GWC Center.

In the town hall meeting last month, Kelly Moore, the acting APHIS administrator, and Carson Hawley, its acting chief operating officer, told employees they expected the building would only be closed for a few days but would email them later to confirm. APHIS made that immediate decision unilaterally, they said, but USDA owns the building and would make future determinations.

In the interim, employees told one another they felt disgusted by the conditions and, in some cases, became so paranoid that they were constantly itchy. The back-and-forth nature has also left staff distraught as they await the next turn of events.

“They treated the building, and then they sent people home again because of offgassing,” said another employee, who, like all of those quoted in this story, spoke on the condition of anonymity out of fear of reprisal. “Then they came back. Now there’s more bedbugs.”

Another worker said employees had “returned to an office that was making them sick because the chemicals hadn’t aired out.” That person lamented that employees were required to take personal leave if they did not want to work in a building still infested with bed bugs, noting many of them rely on public transportation and had not received instruction on preventing the spread of the insects in that setting.

In an email to staff on Friday, Hawley suggested that employees were responsible for the return of the bed bugs as they engaged in “insufficient compliance regarding personal items.” She instructed employees to place all those belongings into garbage bags and remove them from the building.

“We appreciate your support and compliance so that APHIS can do our part to ensure that Building 3 is bedbug free,” Hawley said.

A USDA spokesperson also attributed the bed bugs’ reemergence to employee negligence. The spokesperson declined to explain why employees have not been offered another chance to work remotely.

“USDA took prompt and robust action several weeks ago,” the spokesperson said. “Unfortunately, personal belongings left in the offices caused further issue. Animal Pest and Plant Health Inspection Service management is working with employees to ensure the spaces are emptied for proper mitigation.”

Employees said they were hesitant to bring their belongings out of the office and further risk introducing bed bugs into their own homes. They have also discussed among themselves the possibility of filing a complaint with the Occupational Safety and Health Administration, but fear retribution for doing so.

“They are scared,” one worker said of their colleagues. “If you bring them home, the answer is to trash all of your belongings and fumigate your house at your own expense.”

APHIS is currently responding to crises including bird flu and the spread of New World screwworm, which in recent days was found within 50 miles of the U.S. border. Those response efforts are not centralized in Washington, though some staffers raised concerns about the impacts the hazardous working conditions and the push for staff to take time off would have on that critical work.

“Not allowing employees to telework while the office is infested with bed bugs is an unnecessary significant risk to U.S. cattle health, with experts dealing with the NWS situation forced to go home if they don’t want to get bed bugs,” one employee said.

Staff also questioned why USDA did not authorize a special category of paid time off known as “weather and safety leave,” which federal agencies can turn to when conditions arise that prevent employees from “safely performing work at an approved location.”

USDA is currently looking to relocate thousands of employees out of the Washington region as part of a larger reorganization effort. That is set to result in the offloading of the George Washington Carver Center.