My two cents say that they were enabled and encouraged by The Elected Won and his minions, Get rid of them without getting rid of him won't do us a lot of good. But we should think of at least 2 historical times (Egypt and Japan) when the Lord High Poo Bah simply moved his inner Royal Court to a new location and left the bureaucrats behind to languish in the now-unused Old Capital. Great for thinning out the ranks.
Neither would getting rid of him without getting ready of them and all the other "fellows travelers" safely ensconced in the federal bureaucracy - you can't vote or term limit their union-protected tushes out of office.