With No One to Do Paperwork, Top Hires Stall at U.S. Agencies

The Trump administration can’t fill a growing list of vacancies in key political-appointment posts because there’s no one to process the paperwork during the partial government shutdown.

Appointments to agencies that the administration can make without Senate confirmation are largely on hold because the Office of Personnel Management is closed, OPM General Counsel Mark Robbins told Bloomberg Law. Federal law prevents the office, which acts as a government human resources shop, from processing payroll and other paperwork for those positions unless there’s a national security or similar emergency, or another urgent reason.

The political appointment process has been going slowly ...