GovernmentExecutive.com

Oops, our mistake. That appears to be the latest message from the Social Security Administration inspector general's office about its effort to impose millions of dollars in fines on four Social Security Administration employees. According to the National Treasury Employees Union, which is representing three of the four workers in challenging the penalties, the IG's office has agreed not only to withdraw the proposed fines, but not to seek any other punishments, either. The employees were accused of using expert testimony improperly to help justify benefits decisions. But NTEU pointed out that they did so at the direction of an administrative law judge.

Between this news and Karen Rutzick's report yesterday that the International Federation of Professional and Technical Engineers had launched an effort to represent analysts at the Government Accountability Office, it's been quite a run for organized labor in the federal sector lately. Karen will explore labor's resurgence in more detail in the Feb. 1 issue of Government Executive.