Jeremy Quick, a supply management specialist with Logistics Readiness Center Rheinland-Pfalz, moves food rations with a forklift at a warehouse in Baumholder, Germany, in 2024. (Cameron Porter/U.S. Army)
KAISERSLAUTERN, Germany — Germany will front the salaries of nearly 12,000 local national employees at U.S. military bases if the federal government shutdown delays October paychecks, Rheinland-Pfalz officials said Wednesday.
The state is home to the largest concentration of U.S. forces in Germany, including Ramstein Air Base and U.S. Army Garrison Rheinland-Pfalz.
State officials said they had urged the German finance ministry to step in and ensure payment of the wages owed to Germans employed at the assorted U.S. military bases within its territory. Their numbers account for more than half of the country’s total.
The ministry is preparing approximately $50 million in emergency funding to ensure workers are paid on time, German news outlet Tagesschau reported Wednesday.
Labor union Ver.di, which represents German workers employed at U.S. military installations in the country, had also pressed for action by Berlin amid the ongoing partial shutdown of the U.S. government.
Rheinland-Pfalz is home to the Kaiserslautern Military Community. With tens of thousands of members spread across numerous Army and Air Force bases, it’s the largest overseas U.S. military community.
Other places in Germany that have sizable populations of Defense Department personnel and their families include Bavaria, Stuttgart and Wiesbaden.
A union statement Monday said that the current shutdown, which began Oct. 1, differs from previous ones, when German staffers employed by the U.S. received pay in accordance with German labor law and the NATO Status of Forces Agreement.
Those payments were made with U.S. government approval. No such approval has been granted this time, the union said.
“What is new is that the current U.S. administration is apparently unwilling to comply with German laws,” the Ver.di statement said.
Rheinland-Pfalz officials said Germany expects to be reimbursed once the U.S. government reopens.
