Trump Admin Outlines Criteria for Reclassifying Federal Workers for Easier Termination 👉 Updatem News

The Office of Personnel Management has directed federal agencies to identify employees for reclassification under a new category, making them easier to fire.

The Office of Personnel Management (OPM) has issued detailed guidance for federal agencies on implementing one of President Donald Trump’s executive orders that the president says is intended to make it easier to fire members of the career federal workforce who are performing poorly.

A memo released on Jan. 27 by OPM acting Director Charles Ezell instructs federal agencies to identify positions qualifying for reclassification as Schedule Policy/Career, a new category established by Trump’s Jan. 20 order. Once reclassified, employees in these roles will no longer be protected by the competitive hiring process or traditional job security measures, making it easier to dismiss or replace them.

Ezell’s memorandum outlines criteria for determining which positions qualify for reclassification. These include positions with significant involvement in policy development or advocacy, such as drafting regulations, supervising attorneys, managing collective bargaining efforts, or providing access to confidential policy discussions that influence executive decisions.

The memo directs all federal agencies to submit preliminary recommendations for employee reclassification to OPM within 90 days, paving the way for final approval by the president to formalize the changes.

“Agency heads will then petition OPM to recommend that the President place those positions in Schedule Policy/Career,” Ezell writes in the memo, adding that “a new executive order will subsequently effectuate transfers” of employees into the newly created schedule, allowing for their streamlined dismissal.

Ezell’s memo implements Trump’s executive order—“Restoring Accountability to Policy-Influencing Positions Within the Federal Workforce”—which essentially revives the “Schedule F” order he signed at the end of his first term. The “Schedule F” order went largely unimplemented and was overturned by President Joe Biden after he took office.

Much like the Schedule F order, Trump’s latest action allows agency heads to reclassify certain policy-making positions into a new schedule called Schedule Policy/Career.

Claiming that accountability for civil servants is “sorely lacking,” Trump’s Jan. 20 order notes that just 41 percent of civil service supervisors feel confident in removing employees for misconduct, while barely 26 percent are confident in addressing poor performance. The order also states that there have been numerous cases of career federal employees’ “resisting and undermining” the policies of executive leadership, with the executive action aiming to “restore accountability.”

“Employees in or applicants for Schedule Policy/Career positions are not required to personally or politically support the current President or the policies of the current administration,” Trump’s executive order states. “They are required to faithfully implement administration policies to the best of their ability, consistent with their constitutional oath and the vesting of executive authority solely in the President. Failure to do so is grounds for dismissal.”

Ezell’s memorandum highlights that reclassified positions will become at-will roles, meaning employees can be removed without the procedural protections afforded to most civil service positions.

“Such career positions will be rescheduled into Schedule Policy/Career and thereby exempted from the adverse action procedures set forth in chapter 75 of title 5 of the United States Code,” the memo states.

Trump’s executive order reclassifying numerous federal employees as political appointees has been challenged in court. On Jan. 21, the National Treasury Employees Union (NTEU) filed a lawsuit challenging the order, arguing that it undermines long-standing civil service protections and poses a major threat to the merit-based principles that have governed federal employment for more than a century.

“The radical change that this Executive Order will effect has been widely recognized,” NTEU attorneys wrote in the complaint. “The October 2020 Schedule F Order that was revived through this Executive Order was described as a stunning attempt to politicize the civil service and undermine more than a century of laws aimed at preventing corruption and cronyism in the federal government.”

The White House did not respond to a request for comment on the lawsuit by publication time.

Democrats in Congress have also come out in opposition to Trump’s actions on reviving Schedule F.

Original News Source Link – Epoch Times

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