Scoop: Trump revamps "Schedule F," making it easier to cut federal workers
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The Trump administration on Friday will announce that it's moving ahead with a new rule, previously known as "Schedule F," that will make it easier to remove federal employees it believes are undercutting President Trump's agenda.
Why it matters: By stripping civil service protections from about 50,000 people — roughly 2% of the federal work force — Trump is continuing his far-reaching effort to trim the federal bureaucracy and make it more answerable to him.
- The Office of Personnel Management's new rule — dubbed "Schedule Policy/Career" — will allow many career civil servants to be classified as "at will" employees, making them easier to remove.
- Trump aides argue they need greater flexibility to fire civil servants who are underperforming, engaging in misconduct or undermining Trump's policy plans.
Zoom in: Such civil servants in nonpartisan roles traditionally have had job protections that shielded them from the political whims of whoever was in the White House.
- But Trump and many of his backers have long believed that a "deep state" of Washington bureaucrats was undercutting his agenda.
- Toward the end of his first term, Trump signed an executive order establishing a Schedule F category for federal employees.
- President Biden rescinded the order after he took office, but after taking office again in January, Trump signed a new executive order reinstating and renaming it.
While he was out of office, Trump and his allies laid the groundwork for a new administration stocked with loyalists. Schedule F was a significant part of that plan
- Many of the Trump allies who pushed for Schedule F now have key roles in the administration, including Deputy Chief of Staff Stephen Miller and Management of Budget Director Russ Vought.
- "They are making decisions and those decisions should be in line with the president's agenda. Unelected career bureaucrats should be held accountable to the agenda Americans vote for," said a White House official.
Between the lines: The new rule will impact workers involved in policymaking, according to two White House officials familiar with the plan.
- About 50,000 people are likely to be reclassified as "at will" employees, according to an OPM estimate.
- Critics have said that Trump's broadly worded executive order could put far more civil servants in jeopardy of losing their jobs.
- Earlier this month, some federal agencies started making recommendations for which positions should be reclassified under the new rule, according to a White House official.
The big picture: The wave of firings expected to be the fallout from the successor to Schedule F comes as the administration, largely through Elon Musk's DOGE team, continues to make huge cuts in government personnel and funding.
- Critics say those cuts have threatened the functioning of the government, set back government health, education and research efforts, and threatened access to crucial programs such as Social Security, Medicare and Medicaid.
The other side: Trump's plans to implement the rule has drawn aggressive pushback from labor groups.
- The American Federation of Government Employees and the American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees (AFSCME) filed a lawsuit against the administration in February, alleging that it overstepped its authority in reversing Biden's regulation protecting civil servants.
- "Schedule F is a shameless attempt to politicize the federal workforce by replacing thousands of dedicated, qualified civil servants with political cronies," AFSCME President Lee Saunders said then.
