As furloughed government workers approach their first weekend without a paycheck, The Passenger is stepping up to help a few of them out—if they know their way around a rail drink or two.

Two federal employees—one from the International Trade Commission and another at the Department of Justice—will sling drinks at the Shaw watering hole’s upstairs bar on Saturday. Both are returning to their roots, having tended bar in D.C. before moving to government work. It’s a life Andrea Tateosian, The Passenger’s bar manager who dreamed up the event, is familiar with.

“When I first moved to D.C., I started waiting tables when I was an intern and wasn’t being paid enough to live in this city,” Tateosian says. “A lot of people double down on their hustle to go for their dreams here. I thought we could get some people who had that experience and who could dust off their skills and put them to work.”

The feds-turned-bartenders, who Tateosian hired for the event after putting out a call on Facebook, will work from a special menu of $10-$12 “respectfully shutdown-themed drinks,” as she puts it. “If I were bartending, the drink names would be more pointed.” 

Instead of snark, Tateosian is going for a positive event. A DJ is planned, and she’s hoping a dance party breaks out. Federal employees will receive 20 percent off their bill, a deal that continues through the end of the shutdown. Should feds still be out of work by next weekend, she’s got another event in the works, with guest bartenders already lined up. 

Tateosian says the bar and restaurant industry is uniquely qualified to step up and help government workers make ends meet during the shutdown, which, on the day this event takes place, will be the longest in U.S. history.

“We have a unique perspective on this as bartenders and bar owners,” Tateosian says. “Our money is not always guaranteed. Sometimes you have a slow night, sometimes you have a busy night. We have a unique perspective on that sense of uncertainty. So we try to turn lemons into whiskey sours.”