Lawmakers have been pushing forward various bills over the last several weeks, all aiming to reshape different aspects of federal employment and benefits. Most recently, proposals on Capitol Hill have sought to address issues such as workplace health and safety, employee benefits, cybersecurity protections and hiring practices. Heading into the fall, here are just a handful of the current efforts in Congress that may bring changes for federal employees. Identity protection for feds Democrats, for one, are seeking to boost protections for federal employees. Sen. Mark Warner (D-Va.) and Del. Eleanor Holmes Norton (D-D.C.) introduced a bill earlier this month, called the RECOVER PII Act. It would offer lifetime identity protection coverage to federal employees and contractors who were impacted by the 2015 data breach at the Office of Personnel Management. A major cybersecurity incident in 2015 at OPM compromised personal information of about 22 million individuals who were associated with the federal government. Although victims of the data breach, at the time, were afforded 10 years of identity protection coverage from Congress, that benefit is set to expire on Sept. 30 this year. The new legislation seeks to extend coverage to qualifying individuals for life. “More than 10 years after the OPM data breach exposed the personal information of millions of federal employees, the threat remains,” Warner said. “We have a responsibility to stand by the federal workers who were put at risk through no fault of their own.” Currently, eligible federal employees get 12 weeks of unpaid leave under the Family and Medical Leave Act (FMLA) — a benefit that is also available to private sector employees. Although federal employees have access to paid parental leave due to a 2019 law, family and medical leave remains unpaid time off. The new legislation, led by Sen. Brian Schatz (D-Hawaii),