President Donald Trump’s effort to trim the fat in the federal government has met with another obstacle: A federal judge who recently ordered the White House to rehire tens of thousands of probationary employees who were recently fired.
U.S. District Judge William Alsup on Thursday issued the ruling, which imposed a preliminary injunction on the firings, referring to the actions as a “sham” effort to subvert legal guidelines for reducing the federal workforce, according to Politico.
Alsup, a San Francisco-based appointee of President Bill Clinton, ordered the Defense, Treasury, Energy, Interior, Agriculture and Veterans Affairs departments to “immediately” offer all fired probationary employees their jobs back. The Office of Personnel Management, the judge said, had made an “unlawful” decision to terminate them.
The order is one of the most far-reaching rejections of the Trump administration’s effort to slash the bureaucracy and is almost certain to be appealed.
Alsup also lashed out at the Justice Department over its handling of the case, saying he believes that Trump administration lawyers were hiding the facts about who directed the mass firings.
“You will not bring the people in here to be cross-examined. You’re afraid to do so because you know cross examination would reveal the truth,” the judge said to a DOJ attorney during a hearing Thursday. “I tend to doubt that you’re telling me the truth. … I’m tired of seeing you stonewall on trying to get at the truth.”
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Judge Alsup previously ordered acting OMB director Charles Ezell to testify before the court on Thursday. However, the Justice Department refused to allow Ezell to participate in the proceedings, according to CNN.
It is unclear whether the Trump administration will challenge the ruling. There would likely be questions as to whether Alsup possesses the authority to make such a ruling. Courts are typically empowered to review employment actions if there are claims of constitutional violations or agency misconduct. However, probationary employees have fewer protections than full-time career federal workers.
The Supreme Court previously ruled in the 1988 case United States v. Fausto that the courts should not interfere with discretionary executive branch employment decisions unless Congress provides a statutory basis for such a move.
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