THE FOREIGN SERVICE JOURNAL | JULY-AUGUST 2025 71 AFSA TERM REPORT Most recently, as the State Department sought to comply with all the new Trump administration executive orders to return to in-office work and to prepare for major budget cuts, AFSA focused our advocacy on protecting domestic employees teleworking overseas (DETO) options for our FS tandems and began our advocacy on expanding Voluntary Early Retirement Authority (VERA) for the Foreign Service. We are continuing to do everything possible to hold the department accountable, including to the rules within the Foreign Affairs Manual on reductions in force (RIF). AFSA’s work delivered positive results for Foreign Service families. We are proud to work together with employees to improve and expand emergency visitation travel for our FS families needing to care for loved ones. We worked closely with department leadership and with the CDC to find a positive path that clarified the dog import restrictions rules and a waiver period to allow for dogs to get fully vaccinated and certified for their return to the United States. For more than a year, we pushed and finally won reinstatement of the State Department emergency backup care (EBUC) program offering every employee up to five days of reimbursable backup childcare, eldercare, and self-care a year following the NDAA FY 2023 authorization of a $2 million program. Many years of advocacy culminated last year with new MED clearance procedures that simplify the bidding process for those with special needs education children and put overseas special education decisions into parents’ hands. Our advocacy extended to the greater FS community, too. Throughout the Israel-Hamas conflict and other global emergencies, we listened to first- and second-tour officers and FS families on the ground, and we met with various employee organizations to advocate for mental health and other community support. We partnered with Bureau of Global Talent Management and the Foreign Service Institute to promote career-long learning and continuous employee feedback through the FSI leadership courses and the newly launched “Journey to Unleash Manager Potential” (JUMP Initiative). We even joined forces with the Bureau of Overseas Buildings and Operations on a global education campaign that gave FS families lifesaving road safety tips as we all observed the November 17 World Day of Remembrance for Road Traffic Victims. These accomplishments showcase AFSA as the effective voice of the Foreign Service. Our small but mighty team is maximizing our efforts to support our members, and this legacy of wins will continue to drive our advocacy beyond 2025 as we face many new challenges ahead. Retiree Services During the past two years, AFSA’s retirement services team continued to assist and advocate for current and future Foreign Service retirees and provide them with information and guidance to make the most of their retirement benefits. The online, print, and video resources developed by AFSA’s retirement services team in recent years served as crucial resources to active-duty employees in the wake of moves by the Trump administration to downsize the foreign affairs agencies. AFSA augmented the more than 100 documents and links already on its retirement resources webpage with new written guidance and new webinars—including a series of expert presentations developed in conjunction with veteran Foreign Service Institute staff on finances and career transition, especially tailored for members being forced out of the Service. AFSA’s staff and Governing Board members fielded hundreds of inquiries from members asking about retirement rules and played a critical role in liaising with State Department offices to clarify relatively obscure retirement regulations for the benefit of our members. Foreign Service retirees also found AFSA’s online resources to be vital after the State Department removed most of the content from its RNet website. AFSA also played a key role in notifying retirees of cyber threats bearing on the Employee/Annuitant Express website, as department offices do not have the capacity to notify all retirees. As always, updates and guidance on federal benefits also continued to be featured in AFSA’s bimonthly retirement e-newsletter, in single-issue AFSAnet emails alerting members to important developments, and in the annual retiree directory, which, along with contact information for fellow retirees, includes 25 pages of benefits guidance. Even prior to the surge in member inquiries in early 2025, AFSA Counselor for Retirees Dolores Brown (herself an FS retiree) worked one on one with hundreds of retirees and active-duty employees to answer
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