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Good morning all

Kabar - I always appreciate reading your thoughtful posts. I remember hearing what you said about Clinton converting appointees to civil servants, but had forgotten about it.
I heard yesterday on Fox (IIRC it was J. Christian Adams that said it) that the attorneys in the civil rights division of the DOJ were the most biased (may not have been his word, but what he said was strong) in the DOJ.

Questions for you:
do you know if all/most of the attorneys in the DOJ have been converted to civil service positions so that President Trump couldn’t easily get rid of them?

I suspect it will be difficult to terminate a civil service employee - is that correct? I ask this b/c I think the government needs to be scaled down by a lot and only those that actually fulfill a purpose and work hard (just like with major corporations) should remain.

do you know if all/most of the attorneys in the DOJ have been converted to civil service positions so that President Trump couldn’t easily get rid of them?

I don't know without researching it. You can query the Plum list that has the political appointee jobs by agency, I doubt that all or most of the jobs were converted into civil service positions, but I have no doubt that the Dems are insinuating people into the career bureaucracy. And these are high level jobs.

It is very difficult to terminate a career civil service employee. The only real way that you can combat what is taking place is thru the elimination of jobs, i.e., a reduction in force. It could be used to root out the political appointees who have been converted into career employees. Their retreat rights would be limited and come in conflict with real career employees.

U.S. Sen. John Thune (R-S.D.), chairman of the Senate Committee on Commerce, Science, and Transportation, Sen. Ron Johnson (R-Wis.), chairman of the Senate Committee on Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs, Rep. Fred Upton (R-Mich.), chairman of the House Committee on Energy and Commerce, and Rep. Jason Chaffetz (R-Utah) chairman of the House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform, have asked the U.S. Government Accountability Office (GAO) to conduct a review of political appointee conversions to career federal civil service positions.

The possibility of “burrowing in,” especially at the end of a presidential administration, may affect the integrity of the federal workforce by allowing political appointees to assume career positions through favoritism as opposed to a merit-based selection process. In past administrations, GAO has identified examples where administration officials failed to follow laws and regulations intended to ensure that political appointees seeking career positions do not receive unfair advantages. GAO released its last report on conversions in June 2010 covering the last transition of presidential administrations from May 2005 to May 2009.