Trump administration to end job protections for up to 50,000 federal workers

WASHINGTON - US President Donald Trump will have more power to

hire and fire up to 50,000 career federal employees

in an overhaul of the government’s civil service system announced by his administration on Feb 5.

The overhaul, released by the Office of Personnel Management (OPM), fulfils Mr Trump’s campaign pledge to strip job protections from federal workers deemed by the president’s team to be “influencing” government policy.

It is the biggest change to the rules governing the civil service in more than a century and targets employees that the administration sees as undermining the president’s priorities.

Mr Trump called the overhaul “Schedule F” during his first administration.

“You can’t run an organisation if people are refusing to actually carry out the lawful objectives and orders of the administration,” said OPM director Scott Kupor, the administration’s top HR official.

The rule will be scrutinised by a federal judge.

Federal worker unions and their allies sued in January to stop the policy before it was fully developed. Federal judges paused the litigation while the Trump administration finalised changes.

A court challenge will resume in the coming days, said Ms Skye Perryman of Democracy Forward, one of the groups behind the lawsuit.

“We will return to court to stop this unlawful rule and will use every legal tool available to hold this administration accountable,” she said in a statement.

Mr Trump will have the power to select which government positions will lose their job protections, according to the policy the Trump administration released on Feb 5.

Changes to whistleblower protections

The Trump administration is also changing how long-standing legal protections that prohibit US government agencies from retaliating against whistleblowers will be enforced, the OPM statement said.

Federal agencies will be in charge of setting up job protections for their own employees who accuse them of wrongdoing, such as violating the law or wasting money. That would be a change from the past, when an independent office known as the Office of the Special Counsel was charged with protecting whistleblowers from reprisal.

The Trump administration will require agency officials be “unbiased” when investigating accusations from whistleblowers that their employer retaliated against them, an OPM official told reporters early on Feb 5.

Reuters previously reported that the Trump administration was close to making this change. REUTERS