As the Trump administration tries to get to the bottom of government waste, fraud, and abuse, another district judge is intervening. On Thursday, U.S. District Judge William Alsup, who was appointed by President Bill Clinton and whose district is in the Northern District of California, ruled that memos from the Office of Personnel Management directing agencies to fire probationary employees must be rescinded, as they were likely not lawful.
The Hill covered Alsup's decision on Thursday night [emphasis added]:
A federal judge on Thursday ordered the Office of Personnel Management (OPM) to rescind memos that directed agencies across the federal government to fire probationary employees, finding they were likely unlawful.
U.S. District Judge William Alsup said OPM must notify agencies it did not have the authority to call for the firing of those employees but stopped short of directing agencies themselves not to continue with terminations.
The order only applies to agencies with ties to the plaintiffs in the case, but the judge urged the government to go a step further and notify other agencies as well.
“(The) Office of Personnel Management does not have any authority whatsoever, under any statute in the history of the universe, to hire and fire employees within another agency,” Alsup said.
“The agencies could thumb their nose at OPM if they wanted to,” he added.
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A coalition of government employee unions sued over OPM’s directive to agency leaders to fire employees still in their probationary period, which may last anywhere from one to two years after being hired. Those employees still have workplace protections, but it is easier to remove them.
The directive, which was expected to impact up to 200,000 employees, reversed another memo days earlier telling agencies to only remove probationary employees if they were poor performers.
That the OMB already put out a memo that reversed another one, so as to focus on "poor performers" makes the case a particularly curious one, as it's worth wondering why such federal employees would be worth protecting. There's also another hearing to take place in this case, as the article also mentioned, with another opinion from Alsup coming "in due course."
This is not the only ruling in recent weeks to do with layoffs. Last Thursday, U.S. District Judge Christopher Cooper, an appointee from President Barack Obama, ruled against government employee unions bringing lawsuits, as federal law mandates that they would have had to bring such suits before the the Federal Labor Relations Authority (FLRA).
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