A Year After the CDC Shooting, Here Is What the Law Still Gives Federal Employees

Federal employees processing a traumatic event at work often assume the legal protections available to them ran out when the news coverage stopped. They did not. A year after a gunman opened fire on CDC headquarters in Atlanta, the protections that matter most to the people still carrying that day are the quiet, procedural ones — and each of them has a deadline.

What CDC Employees Are Saying a Year Later

The president of the union local at CDC headquarters put it on the record last week: “You know how they say taking you to hell and back? We haven’t gotten back. We’re still in hell.”

Officer David Rose died responding to that attack. The union says there is damage from that day that still has not been repaired.

Employees have also told reporters that when leadership shows up, it does not land as support. One staffer — unnamed, because she is afraid of retaliation — described the theme from top leadership as the idea that nobody trusts public health because CDC did not listen. Her word for that was “victim blaming.”

HHS says that characterization is false, states that the Secretary “unequivocally condemns” the attack, and says the Department is “fully committed to the safety and well-being of every CDC employee.” That is the agency’s statement, and readers can weigh it.

What is not in dispute is the scale of what the agency has lost — by the accounts being reported, roughly thirty percent of its workforce since 2024, two directors, and a police officer.

Three Things That Are Still Standing

Whatever your view of how leadership has handled the aftermath, the following protections do not depend on it.

Workers’ Compensation Covers Psychological Injury

The Federal Employees’ Compensation Act, at 5 U.S.C. § 8102, provides compensation for injury sustained in the performance of duty. “Injury” under FECA was never limited to broken bones — psychological injury can qualify. The filing period under 5 U.S.C. § 8122 is three years.

Please note: our firm does not handle OWCP matters, so please do not contact us about workers’ compensation claims. Your union, an OWCP-focused practitioner, or your agency’s workers’ compensation specialist is the right resource.

Your Agency Cannot Punish You for Saying the Building Is Not Safe

Federal agency safety programs are governed by 29 C.F.R. Part 1960. Section 1960.46 requires agency heads to ensure that no employee is subject to “restraint, interference, coercion, discrimination or reprisal for filing a report of an unsafe or unhealthful working condition.”

That rule exists precisely for the employee who would not give her name to a reporter. Reporting a hazard is protected activity, and an agency that responds to a safety report with a personnel action has a problem.

PTSD, Anxiety, and Depression Can Support an Accommodation Request

PTSD is a disability. So are anxiety and depression. That means telework, a schedule change, or reassignment out of the building where the event happened can be the subject of a reasonable accommodation request under the Rehabilitation Act.

The agency is required to actually engage with the request through the interactive process. “No” delivered without engagement is itself a problem, and it is one the EEO process is designed to address.

Every One of These Has a Clock

None of this is automatic. Each protection requires a request in writing, and each one runs on a deadline that does not pause because you are still recovering.

• FECA claims: three years under 5 U.S.C. § 8122
• EEO complaints: 45 days to contact an EEO counselor from the date of the action you are challenging
• Accommodation requests: no fixed statutory deadline to ask, but the record you build starts the day you put it in writing

Put your request in writing. Keep a copy. Note the date. If your agency responds with silence or with a personnel action, that record is what a later case is built on.

If You Reported a Problem and Got a Problem Back

If you asked for an accommodation or reported an unsafe condition and what you received in return was discipline, a schedule change you did not ask for, a performance action, or a sudden reassignment, that sequence is worth having someone look at.

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Save this. Then send it to the coworker who has not been the same since last August.

Legal Disclaimer: This content is for general informational purposes only and does not constitute legal advice. Federal employment situations are fact-specific and time-sensitive. Please consult a qualified federal employment attorney about your specific situation. You can contact Southworth PC at attorneysforfederalemployees.com.