'Stunning' Executive Order Would Politicize Civil Service

[BeckyDem]

Trump, horrendous until the bitter end!



President Trump signs directive that would potentially pull thousands of federal employees in "policy-making" positions out of the competitive service, making them at-will employees.

OCTOBER 22, 2020 12:56 PM ET


President Trump on Wednesday signed an executive order creating a new classification of “policy-making” federal employees that could strip swaths of the federal workforce of civil service protections just before the next president is sworn into office.

The order would create a new Schedule F within the excepted service of the federal government, to be composed of “employees in confidential, policy-determining, policy-making, or policy-advocating positions,” and instructs agency heads to determine which current employees fit this definition and move them—whether they are members of the competitive service or other schedules within the excepted service—into this new classification. Federal regulations stating that employees hired into the competitive service retain that status even if their position is moved to the excepted service will not apply to Schedule F transfers.

Positions in the new Schedule F would effectively constitute at-will employment, without any of the protections against adverse personnel actions that most federal workers currently enjoy, although individual agencies are tasked with establishing “rules to prohibit the same personnel practices prohibited” by Title 5 of the U.S. Code. The order also instructs the Federal Labor Relations Authority to examine whether Schedule F employees should be removed from their bargaining units, a move that would bar them from being represented by federal employee unions.

“Except as required by statute, the civil service rules and regulations shall not apply to removals from positions listed in Schedules A, C, D, E, or F, or from positions excepted from the competitive service by statute,” the order states.

The order sets a swift timetable for implementation: Agencies have 90 days to conduct a “preliminary” review of their workforces to determine who should be moved into the new employee classification—a deadline that coincides with Jan. 19, the day before the next presidential inauguration.

https://www.govexec.com/management/2020/10/stunning-executive-order-would-politicize-civil-service/169479/

[sharp_stick]

1. If we don't get rid of this lying spew of liquid sewage

we're totally fucked.

I'm taking election day off so I can drive as many people as possible to vote against Trump as possible.

[BeckyDem]

3. He has to be defeated, absolutely.

I believe we are going to get there but it is nerve-racking!

[sharp_stick]

7. I'm not one to wish away time but damn

I really can't wait until this election is over.

[BeckyDem]

10. I can't take much more either.

Our country needs two important wins. A vaccine that we know will be viable and Trump gone.
Once we have that, we can and will begin recovery with Biden.

[Celerity]

18. +10000000000000000

[lostnfound]

24. They don't appear to be expecting to lose. Nt

[sharp_stick]

25. Everything they do now

is playing to the base. The only chance they've got is a massive turnout of the base along with new voters.

Right now I'm cautiously optimistic that the good guys are as motivated as I am. I'll crawl naked over a field of broken glass to vote against Trump and all of his MAGAt acolytes.

[The Velveteen Ocelot]

2. This way he would get to fire Dr. Fauci.

[BeckyDem]

4. Yes, I believe he could do just that.

[DeminPennswoods]

5. This is a great way for Biden to get rid of rw ideologues who were political

appointees but who have burrowed into the federal civil service bureacracy.

Anyway, it's easy for OPM to reverse paperwork classifications.

[The Velveteen Ocelot]

6. Yes, it could be a situation that backfires on the GOP if applied to their minions.

And Biden could just rehire Fauci.

[DeminPennswoods]

9. Yep, all Biden has to do is ask OPM

to find all federal employees who were hired as schedule C political appointees and cull through them for hire dates coinciding with the years we had GOP presidents. Then convert them to schedule F, fire them and rescind the executive order.

At least that's what I'd do, but then I'm probably a lot more vindictive than Biden.

[BeckyDem]

11. Me too. +1.

[NoMoreRepugs]

8. Now just imagine if he is humiliated by 10-15% in the General Election -

he may nuke something. I'm serious.

[russiamommy]

12. As a former civil servant in a policy-making role...

I can’t tell you how mad this makes me! I also have friends that are still there - somehow they’ve managed to survive the last four years. Many more have left and are waiting in the wings for a Biden administration.

I can’t believe this is even legal. I’m sure it will be challenged. Even if it isn’t, like others have said, it would be easy to undo.

[BeckyDem]

17. It is infuriating! Voters need to know this about him, any undecided voters that is.

His base would love for him to use this kind of power.

[shanti]

27. darn tootin' they would

RW'ers hate government employees of any stripe and love it when they suffer.

[doc03]

13. Can the next president recind Trump's executive

orders? All of them?

[russiamommy]

14. Yes

😃

[doc03]

16. Biden has to do like Trump and undo everything

that that pos did.

[BeckyDem]

15. Yes. It is stunning how Trump is preparing to do more damage if he were

to win and why this executive order is so important for voters to understand. He has to be defeated, he will never stop undermining democracy.

[jmowreader]

33. Absolutely, and there's no reason why he wouldn't...

...especially since Trump has spent his entire administration undoing President Obama's time in office. He's even trying to bring Osama bin Laden back to life, FFS.

Biden's Executive Order 1369: "Both Generalissimo Francisco Franco and Al Qaeda head Osama Bin Laden are still dead."

[OnDoutside]

19. Whether he gets to do this, the incoming admin will be on the look out for booby traps all over the

place. I have no doubt that Trump and his evil gang will cause even more damage on the way out.

[Midnightwalk]

20. The loss of institutional knowledge will be devastating

Which of course is part of the plan.

These policies aren’t just to intimidate or punish employees for doing the right thing. By forcing experienced people out the government will be much less effective.

Businesses and lobbyists and our foreign adversaries all benefit from this.

[BeckyDem]

22. +1. That is the plan, he wants a seamless opinion, his narrative uninterrupted.

[DFW]

21. This sounds way too sophisticated for Trump to have thought up

I smell Miller, Bannon, or McTurtle.

[BeckyDem]

23. Could be, so many sociopaths, so little time.

[Yo_Mama_Been_Loggin]

26. The whole reason we have the Civil Service system was to prevent what Trump is trying to do.

In the past government jobs went to the friends and lackeys of elected officials. This was known as the "spoils system" as in "to the victors the spoils."

Many of these people were unqualified for the job they were given.

[shanti]

28. +1

That's exactly what they want.

[BeckyDem]

32. Exactly why Trump wants to change it.

[BlueLucy]

29. This is likely something Putin wanted him t o cross of the list before the election. nt

We need to get this piece of shit out!

[crickets]

30. There has been no repeal of the Civil Service Reform Act

Apologies for a naive question, but legally, can he actually do this? In know trump does what he wants, but that's not my question. There is legislation currently in place - isn't there a problem if presidents throw out that legislation with the sweep of pen? Congress passes the law, not the president. Do they have any pushback?

[BeckyDem]

31. Good question! From the wording of the executive order, and I am presuming

his office of legal counsel wrote it? He is creating a different category and it seems to do a run around the original protections.

Bush's legal council came up with an excuse to torture, which fell apart legally but not in time enough to stop the practice.


But yea, there is pushback, how far they can take it, I don't know. Trump must be defeated, that is paramount.

Congressman Gerry Connolly (D-VA), Chairman of the House Subcommittee on Government Operations, released the following statement today regarding President Trump's order removing many career federal employees from the competitive service, costing them important civil service protections and stripping them of their eligibility to be represented by a union:

"This Executive Order is yet another attack on federal employees that addresses absolutely none of the issues that can hinder effective federal recruitment and hiring. It’s a cheap ploy to let the Trump Administration replace talent and acumen with fealty and self-dealing.”

https://connolly.house.gov/news/documentsingle.aspx?DocumentID=4110