Free Republic

The Government now asks us to stay the district court’s preliminary injunction. Among other things, the Government argues that the States lack Article III standing to challenge the terminations and that the district court lacked subject-matter jurisdiction because the Civil Service Reform Act of 1978, Pub. L. No. 95-454, provides the exclusive means for review of personnel actions taken against federal employees.... The Government is likely to succeed in showing the district court lacked jurisdiction over Plaintiffs’ claims, and the Government is unlikely to recover the funds disbursed to reinstated probationary employees.

The Supreme Court on Tuesday halted a federal judge's ruling requiring several federal agencies to reinstate around 16,000 workers the Trump administration had sought to fire. The decision to grant the administration's request means the federal government doesn't have to take steps to bring back some workers who were laid off while litigation moves forward before a federal judge in California.

Federal agencies have accelerated their efforts to cut thousands of jobs, offering buyouts and eliminating entire offices as the Trump administration’s deadline to downsize approaches. At least six federal agencies have in recent days extended a “deferred resignation” offer that was originally pitched to government workers in January as a one-time opportunity that would allow employees to resign but continue to be paid for a period of time.

The City of Los Angeles is bracing for layoffs of thousands of municipal employees due to a budget crisis that is said to be “inevitable,” as the city is reeling from recent wildfires and still preparing to host the 2028 Summer Olympics. The Los Angeles Times reported: L.A.’s financial problems exploded into a full-blown crisis on Wednesday, with the city’s top budget official announcing that next year’s shortfall is now just shy of $1 billion, making layoffs “nearly inevitable.” City Administrative Officer Matt Szabo advised the City Council to focus on cost-cutting measures, including a potential reduction in the size...

Elon Musk took to social media to allege that the identities of deceased people, or "non-existent" people, were being used by unauthorized persons to collect federal paychecks. Musk sent out an email to federal employees across departments on Saturday in which he asked them to justify their jobs, requesting that they "reply to this email with approx. 5 bullets of what you accomplished this week and cc your manager." The reason this matters is that a significant number of people who are supposed to be working for the government are doing so little work that they are not checking their...

Recently fired US Agency for International Development (USAID) staff scrawled messages on boxes full of their personal belongings Friday — and several ex-employees were seen beaming as they were cheered on by supporters on their last day in the office. “You can take the humanitarians out of USAID but you can’t take the humanity out of the humanitarians,” read one upbeat message on a former worker’s box that held a large plant among other items. “We are abandoning the world,” read another note on the container of a different ex-federal employee’s belongings. The axed employees were applauded by former USAID...

America First Legal (AFL) has sued the Biden administration's Health and Human Services (HHS) department as well as the National Archives (NARA) for allegedly deleting the emails of former Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) employees. Last week AFL took legal action against HHS and NARA for allegedly deleting files against the law from CDC employees' emails. In a press release from AFL, the law firm stated that it was suing "Secretary Xavier Becerra, the US Department of Health and Human Services, the Archivist of the United States Colleen Shogan, and the National Archives and Records Administration (NARA) for...

The Trump administration has directed federal agencies to fire most trial period and probationary staff within two days. This decision targets many of the roughly 200,000 people hired by the federal government within the last two years. The Office of Personnel Management (OPM) has advised agencies to dismiss employees who are still within their probationary period, typically one or two years. This directive affects 200,000 probationary employees. Additionally, about 75,000 federal employees have accepted buyouts. In total, 275,000 federal employees are impacted by these measures.

After issuing two stays, U.S. District Judge George O'Toole has declined to block the Trump administration's deferred resignation program for federal employees. The ruling comes more than two weeks after the U.S. Office of Personnel Management (OPM) sent an email to more than 2 million civilian employees of the federal government with the subject line "Fork in the Road."

WASHINGTON — A different kind of gridlock is headed to a key section of the nation’s capital. DC Councilman Charles Allen (D-Ward 6) on Sunday warned his constituents in the Navy Yard area to brace for “major congestion” starting Monday, when thousands of naval employees begin returning to in-person work there. “Requiring all in-person work without helping agencies plan = mess,” Allen wrote on X. “16,000+ employees all report in person. Expecting 8-10,000 cars, but have 4,473 parking spots. “Avoid area if you can.” Allen cited data from a memo he apparently received, though it’s not entirely clear from where...

Rep. Jamie Raskin (D-Md) went on MSNBC's The ReidOut to warn that "Elon Musk and President Donald Trump are conducting a rapidly expanding and accelerating coup. The President is supposed to protect the government from foreign invaders. Yet, Trump has unleashed a foreigner--Elon Musk--to demolish long-standing agencies for being inefficient." "In a way, this was predictable," Raskin observed. "Neither Trump nor Musk understands that government isn't supposed to be efficient. Trump and Musk aren't experienced members of the government like most of the members of Congress like myself. They see that the government has a 'merit' system for dealing with...

Topline A federal judge temporarily blocked President Donald Trump’s buyout offer to federal civilian employees from taking effect Thursday, hours before the deadline the administration set for more than 2 million employees to decide whether to take resignation packages with pay through September. Timeline Feb. 6: A federal judge in Massachusetts pushed back the deadline for employees to accept the offer, initially set for 11:59 p.m. Thursday, until at least Monday in response to a lawsuit filed by federal workers unions that argued the administration could not guarantee pay beyond March 14 expiration date for the existing budget. Feb. 5:...

A federal judge paused Thursday’s deadline for federal employees to accept the Trump administration’s deferred resignation offer while more proceedings on the program’s legality play out. The government will send a notice to the employees informing them that Thursday’s deadline is on hold. Before the judge’s ruling, eligible federal workers had until 11:59 p.m. ET on Thursday to decide whether to take the Trump administration’s deferred resignation offer, which will generally allow them to leave their jobs but be paid through the end of September. The pause stems from a lawsuit that the American Federation of Government Employees and several...

The Swamp purge continues as dozens of Education Department employees were placed on leave, according to reports. CNN first reported the news of the administrative leave, noting that it is connected to the Trump administration’s goal of putting an end to wasteful diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) efforts in the federal workforce. “Effective January 31, 2025, you will be placed on administrative leave with full pay and benefits pursuant to the President’s executive order on DEIA and further guidance from OPM,” the letter sent to affected employees states, making it clear the administrative leave is not related to disciplinary measures.

The reasons for this are unclear, but it appears that on Friday, aides to the Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) point man Elon Musk apparently locked a significant number of federal government employees at the Office of Personnel Management (OPM) out of their work computer networks, according to anonymous sources in an exclusive story from Reuters:Musk, the billionaire Tesla (TSLA.O) CEO and X owner tasked by Trump to slash the size of the 2.2 million-strong civilian government workforce, has moved swiftly to install allies at the agency known as the Office of Personnel Management.The two officials, who spoke to Reuters...

The mandate is the latest effort in the Trump administration's push to end DEI.

Better leave than wait out the clock. Aspirational workers beware, staying at one company won't get you out of a dead-end role. Gen Zers might be on the right track, as job-hopping is shaping up to be the solution to the workplace blues. Young workers are especially likely to quit a job as a way of getting ahead early on in their careers. Most (83%) consider themselves to be job-hoppers, according to a report from ResumeLab—and they're onto something. New research reveals that sticking to one boss and one company doesn’t always lead to success these days, as workers have...

Meta employees are furious with the company’s newly announced content moderation changes that will allow users to say that LGBTQ+ people have “mental illness,” according to internal conversations obtained by 404 Media and interviews with five current employees. The changes were part of a larger shift Mark Zuckerberg announced Monday to do far less content moderation on Meta platforms. “I am LGBT and Mentally Ill,” one post by an employee on an internal Meta platform called Workplace reads. “Just to let you know that I’ll be taking time out to look after my mental health.” On Monday, Mark Zuckerberg announced...

The Department of Justice (DOJ) Inspector General (IG) released a report on Monday that revealed that three employees had leaked information to the media in an attempt to damage the electoral prospects of Donald Trump. The IG report summary said: The Department of Justice (DOJ) Office of the Inspector General (OIG) initiated an investigation after receiving allegations that actions by a litigating division were politically motivated and violated DOJ policies regarding disclosing information about ongoing matters. The OIG investigation found that three then Senior DOJ Officials violated DOJ’s Confidentiality and Media Contacts Policy by leaking to select reporters, days before...

Last year, we worked together with Senator Joni Ernst’s office to quantify the federal bureaucracy. We asked questions like: How many are there? What are they earning compared to the private sector? Where are they located? How do they perform? And how much vacation do they enjoy on taxpayers’ dime? Many of the answers were pretty damning. [snip] According to the U.S. Census Bureau, the average real wage for a private worker (FY21) was $54,339 – but at 109 of 125 federal agencies in DC, the average salary was over $100K. When questioned by Congress in 2023 about how many...