Posted on 10/31/2020 5:22:57 AM PDT by be-baw
The Trump administration has issued a new executive order that would fundamentally restructure the federal work force, making it easier for the government to fire thousands of federal workers, while also allowing political and other considerations to affect hiring.
The executive order, issued last week, would affect the professional employees who are in policy-making positions at the very top of the civil service — people like lawyers and scientists who are are not political appointees, but serve from administration to administration regardless of which party controls the White House.
The president's order changes that, creating a new category for them — "Schedule F" — and taking away their civil service protections. In a statement that accompanied the order, the White House took aim at those protections, saying they make it too difficult for agency heads to remove "poor performers." Without the protections, the employees can be more easily replaced.
Rachel Greszler, a research fellow at the Heritage Foundation, which supports the order, says it's "a common sense change" to address a lack of accountability in the federal government.
"I've talked to managers in the past who say that they want to do the right thing and they want to hold workers accountable," says Greszler. "They want to get rid of the bad apples who are weighing others down and preventing the agency from carrying out its mission. But ultimately, the managers said they often gave up because they had to spend so much time and so much effort that ... it just wasn't worth it. They determined it was better to just keep these people on the payrolls and shift their job responsibilities to others. And that's a big problem."
But public employee unions say it's Trump's order that's the problem. They've said it could have a chilling effect on the more than 2 million people who make up the federal workforce — most of whom are not political appointees.
"It's a huge attack on the apolitical civil service" says Jacqueline Simon, the policy director at the American Federation of Government Employees, which represents federal workers. She says the order could mean these top positions would no longer be filled by people who have been hired through a competitive process.
"If it's implemented broadly, it could create absolute chaos in the agencies. It could be an absolute fiasco," says Simon. "Everyone's seen what happens if this administration tries to politicize scientific work. We've seen it in CDC and we've seen it in the weather service. We've seen it in EPA, we've seen it all across the agencies. Imagine every single agency undermined by political hacks."
President Trump has railed against federal workers since taking office, baselessly charging there is a deep state within the bureaucracy working to thwart his policies.
Paul Light, a professor of public service at NYU, says most recent presidents have tried to reform the federal workforce, but Trump has taken it to a new level.
"We started with a hiring freeze," he says. "We segued into a shutdown. I think the net effect is really on undermining commitment within the federal workforce and just giving feds a good Halloween scare that is likely to be overturned, but they won't forget."
Light says the net result of the order is to make a career in the federal government less appealing, at a time when many government employees are nearing retirement age.
The executive order has already led to one departure: It prompted the resignation of Ron Sanders, the chairman of the Federal Salary Council.
Sanders, a life-long Republican, says he believes the U.S. civil service is the best in the world. He warns the order could strip the government of sorely needed expertise.
"It's absolutely critical because of the complexity of that world — the laws, the rules, the regulations, the scientific theories, all of the things that go into public policy. Somebody has to understand that. You can't look at the Cliffs Notes and get it. You need people with deep technical expertise who are there regardless of party who provide neutral competence to whoever is in power."
The executive order calls on federal agencies to make a list of positions that would be affected by the new classification by January 19th, the day before Inauguration Day.
What happens next depends on who is sworn in on January 20th. It's likely that Democrat Joe Biden would overturn the order if elected. Democrats in Congress say they'll work to nullify the order, and the National Treasury Employees Union has filed a lawsuit to overturn it in court.
Wrong. THAT is how you create advocates whose “expertise” becomes a religion rather than an rationally-developed conclusion.
If they claim to be apolitical, why are they all leftist social justice pukes?
. I Will admit there’s merit to having institutional memory. But being able to fire A non-performer is critical to an efficient Workforce
“ It would seem so, but recent history says no.
Trump’s attempt to overturn an Obama executive order on immigration with another executive order was rebuffed by the courts.”
************
Yeh, good point. Maybe it’s time to give the supposedly 6 / 3 conservative advantage in the Supreme Court a little test and see whether it’s real or not.
ALL of the npr staff should be fired and the polluting airwave rag should be shut down. What a waste of money!
I’m glad they’re freaking out! That means it is an effective measure. Thank God for PDJT!
Sounds like a great order. So important for Trump tonwi 4 more years so he can finish the job. This time he’ll have a running start.
You’d think that would be the case, but Trump long ago tried to eliminate Obama’s EO regarding daca and was stopped by a judge. It seems a former president’s authority supersedes a successor president.
Democrat EO’s have the force of law and are immutable.
Republican EO’s are the overreaching decrees of a would-be tyrant and should be resisted at all costs.
See the difference.
.....except when it pertains to the Constitution.
While currently it is much too difficult to fire nonperformers I am concerned about the law of unintended consequences. The next Democrat will fire every Conservative and hire political hacks
I pray Trump wins.
If he doesn’t he should govern with an IRON fist till 1/19/21.
Burn down as much as he can. He should issue an Executive Order a day that targets the Swamp. Fire Wray and Haspel and declassify EVERY Deep State Secret he can. Demand Barr launch a Special Counsel into Biden Corruption. If Barr won’t do it, fire him.
THEN - Trump should get out of Real Estate and build a Media Empire comprised of News, Social Media, and Entertainment and DOG Biden EVERY Day. Hire all the best Conservative talent from Fox, etc. and spend the next 2 years on the attack till the 2022 Mid-Terms.
Finally-Trump should run AGAIN in 2024.
The executive order has already led to one departure: It prompted the resignation of Ron Sanders, the chairman of the Federal Salary Council.
“but serve from administration to administration regardless of which party controls the White House”
And after years and years of tenure they serve most the non-elected permanent government in Washington, D.C., not the government elected by the people.
The people have a RIGHT to a new government.
That is what elections are for.
I had a college classmate complaining about this.
When I looked it up, I found that they wanted to introduce the conditions that just about every private company worker works under: If you are dangerously incompetent—you “might” just find yourself fired.
I wrote her back and laughed. I asked if she was good at her job? Then she had nothing to worry about.
“It’s a huge attack on the apolitical civil service” says Jacqueline Simon, the policy director at the American Federation of Government Employees,”
Sorry, NO human being is “apolitical”, merely because their job did not require a political appointment. That idea is a civil service fiction. Everyone has a world view. The idea that merely being a “professional hire” instead of a “political appointee” does not mean the person will not use a world view that greatly opposes the elected officials to thwart what the elected officials want to do. That is no more valid than my company treasurer many years ago telling me our outside auditors’ integrity was insured “because they were all CPAs”.
I think one thing that could be done is get rid of the government running our post office. That work could be done by contract. Basically lay off/fire all the post office workers and if they want their jobs back they would have to put in application in to the company that gets the contract. And run the contracts every 10 years or so before they are renewed or the government gets a new company.
“”It’s a huge attack on the apolitical civil service” says Jacqueline Simon.”
Apolitical my rear end. This is long overdue.
That is the case now and has been forever!
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