When Congressman Gerry Connolly (D-VA) died last year, I wondered what that would mean for the Federal Adjustment of Income Rates (FAIR) Act, the bill that he introduced every year since 2014 with Senator Brian Schatz (D-HI) that always proposed a higher pay raise for federal employees than they were otherwise likely to get. Would it continue to be introduced?
It turns out we need not wonder if this will happen. It seems clear that the legislation is going to continue to be introduced and that Congressman James Walkinshaw (D-VA) is going to take over the missing sponsorship role. He made the announcement in September about carrying forward four bills that Connolly had regularly sponsored, one of which was the FAIR Act.
Walkinshaw said in a statement:
From administering Social Security checks to safeguarding our national security to delivering our mail, civil servants are the backbone of our federal government, providing the essential services that Americans rely on every day. The late Gerry Connolly was their fiercest champion, reminding us that protecting federal workers means protecting the American people they serve. I am honored to carry forward his legacy by advancing these bills to defend the rights, pay, reproductive health care, and retirement security of those who dedicate their lives to public service.
He assumed sponsorship of the 2025 FAIR Act in September. I anticipate that it will be introduced again soon for the 2027 federal pay raise and that he will be the one to do so in the House.
What is the FAIR Act?
The legislation pushes for a higher raise than what federal employees are likely to get from the president. It’s usually the first formal proposal of the year to kick off the annual pay raise debate.
The bill has never become law, so the higher raises it has proposed in the past have never come to pass. However, it does help to shape the next year’s pay raise debate.
The table below shows the spread between what the bill proposed and what actually happened for the last 3 federal pay raises.
| Year | FAIR Act | Actual Raise | Difference |
| 2026 | 4.3% | 1% | 3.3% |
| 2025 | 7.4% | 2% | 5.4% |
| 2024 | 8.7% | 5.2% | 3.5% |
What Will the 2026 Fair Act Bring?
As I said, I anticipate the legislation is going to be introduced again this year, quite likely before the end of the month since the bill was introduced in January the last couple of years.
My guess is that it will be between 4% and 5% since the FAIR Act has historically been 0.5% to 5.4% over what the actual raise turned out to be.
The figures in past versions of the bill are not based on a formula; at least, there is not one spelled out in the text of the legislation. They appear to be policy based in the sense that they are higher than what a president is likely to propose but not as high as the 20%+ raises the Federal Salary Council claims federal employees are owed which has never happened under the Federal Employees Pay Comparability Act (FEPCA).
If and when the FAIR Act is introduced for the 2027 federal pay raise I will of course report on it at that time, so stay tuned to FedSmith for more updates.
