By Joe Davidson · The Washington Post (c) 2024
Donald Trump will enter his second presidential term in January eager and ready to slashthefederal workforce. The potential consequences are massive.
He will occupy the White House with the benefit of experience and, importantly, executive orders from his first stay at the ready for implementation. This time, two high-profile Trump lieutenants will lead an all-out battle for theirplanned “mass headcount reductions across the federal bureaucracy.”
Federal unions will be a favorite target, as they were previously. In 2018, Trumpissued three executive orders that nearly blew away the ability of federal employees – notably, not just union members – to be fully represented by labor organizations, particularly in grievance procedures. President Joe Biden revoked those orders shortly after taking office. Beyond what Trump did before, what he might do next has union leaders ready for a fight.
His “Agenda 47” (so named becauseTrump will be the nation’s 47th president) includes plans for increasing the president’s ability “to remove rogue bureaucrats,” a power he vowed to employ “very aggressively.” He also plans to move up to 100,000 federal jobs out of D.C.
Vivek Ramaswamy, the co-chief of Trump’s so-called Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE), which is not a congressionally created agency, previously proposed a 75 percent cut in the federal workforce. Elon Musk, the other co-chief, has suggested cutting $2 trillion from federal spending, a move that would have a huge impact on government programs, the public and the federal employees who would be the first casualties.
Trump has also pledged to resurrect Schedule F, a rule that would strip job protections from many career federal employees in policy roles.
Trump’s transition team did not respond to a request for comment.
To find out what labor leaders expect, The Washington Post talked with Randy Erwin, president of the National Federation of Federal Employees, the oldest federal union, about the coming Trump redux. The transcript has been edited for clarity and length.
Q: What do you think the next four years with Trump will be like for federal unions and the employees they represent?
A: I would expect Trump to have a very frosty relationship with federal employee unions. Judging by his first act, we are anticipating all kinds of actions that will be punitive to federal employees and their unions. That being said, if the Trump administration did offer some kind of an olive branch and wanted to work together cooperatively with us, we would take him up on that and do it in good faith. Frankly, I would be shocked if we got that olive branch.
Q: The 2018 executive orders weakening union representation and making it easier to fire federal employees withstood legal challenges on procedural grounds. Do you have any legal options as it relates to those orders?
A: Certainly, we would have some legal recourse. The last time we filed a lawsuit that was successful on the merits. The truth is, you don’t have to be ultimately successful [in the courts]. Sometimes the goal is to put some speed bumps in the process, to slow down the process. It is still worthwhile to go down the legal road to object to these executive orders, because when [a lower-court decision against the orders] got overturned, it got overturned on procedural grounds, not the merits of the case. So, we feel the law is on our side.
Q: Do you expect the Trump administration to weaken federal workplace protections to make it easier to fire feds faster?
A: We will pursue all legal options to make sure that the Trump administration is operating within the guardrails of the law. That being said, we do think that the Trump administration will try to dramatically accelerate the process for disciplinary procedures for civil servants.
Q: Another Trump executive order, also revoked by Biden, established Schedule F, a new federal employment category that would strip workforce protections from some feds. The Biden administration also adopted a rule that would make it harder, but not impossible, for Trump to reissue the order. Doing so would allow him to replace civil servants with political loyalists. Schedule F was aimed at policymaking positions, but would it impact rank-and-file workers?
A: They’re making it sound like it’s limited. The problem is once it is established, there is a very strong concern that they’ll continue to expand and expand what federal employees Schedule F applies to.
Q: Even if your members are not reclassified under Schedule F, would it affect them?
A: Instead of having these agency leaders that are the best and brightest and hired for their capability for leading these departments, they’re going to be replaced with political stooges that are running roughshod over everyone who works in those agencies. The guardrails toward disciplining people for coming forward with reports of abuse and things like that will be greatly eroded. That means they’re going to be scared and intimidated.
Q: Although 85 percent of the federal workforce lives outside of the broadly defined Washington region, Trump made a limited effort to relocate agency headquarters from in his first term and plans more of that in the future.
A: Relocation of headquarters in and of itself is not necessarily a bad thing. I think that’s a fair thing for anyone in government to consider. But [Trump’s plan] is so clearly not a good government initiative. They want to hack away at the federal workforce, diminish the ability of these agencies to carry out their duties. The reason they want to relocate is because they think people will not follow the job. They’ll choose to retire. So, this is just a really shady tactic to force a reduction in the size of the workforce. I don’t think they really understand the work that federal employees do. These are people spread all over the country doing important work for the American people.
Q: What would be the impact of Ramaswamy’s suggested 75 percent cut in the federal workforce and Musk’s advocacy of a $2 trillion cut in government spending?
A: That will absolutely decimate. There is not a single service provided to the American people that will not be decimated by that. Start with the impact on veterans. If they’re successful in reducing the federal workforce by 75 percent, there will be half a million veterans laid off. That should be unacceptable to the American people. There is no way for the Department of Veterans Affairs to operate in any form similar to what it is today. If we eliminate 75 percent of the jobs in that agency, we will not be caring for veterans anymore.
This Department of Government Efficiency, I mean, calling it that is really just a joke. They want to make it sound government-y, but not actually making it a government agency is sketchy as hell. It really shows they want legitimacy, without the transparency and accountability that comes with it. And that alone makes the hair on the back of my neck stand up. It tells me they’re up to no good.