Unions File Lawsuit Against Trump Administration for Actions to Dismiss Probationary Workers
A lawsuit has been initiated against the directive issued by the Office of Personnel Management.
On Wednesday evening, a coalition of federal employee unions launched a legal challenge against the Trump administration’s attempts to terminate government employees still serving their probationary period.
According to the lawsuit, “OPM is an agency without any statutory powers to make termination decisions for federal employees (apart from its own staff). Despite this lack of legal authorization, OPM has instructed federal agencies nationwide, including those within this District, to eliminate their ranks of probationary employees without considering applicable laws.”
The unions involved in the lawsuit, which are connected to the AFL-CIO and the American Federation of Government Employees, among others, are taking action against OPM and its acting director, Charles Ezell, in response to a directive aimed at dismissing probationary workers as part of an initiative to reduce the federal workforce.
The complaint further argues that the OPM’s directive concerning probationary employees infringes upon employment law since those employees should only be dismissed due to inadequate performance.
“In one swift move, OPM, the federal agency responsible for enforcing this nation’s employment laws, has committed one of the most extensive employment frauds in U.S. history, misleading tens of thousands of workers into thinking they are being terminated for performance issues when this is far from the truth,” the lawsuit claims.
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The directive regarding probationary employees, who generally serve less than a year in their positions, was issued earlier this month by the OPM, which acts as the federal government’s human resources department.
The exact number of workers currently in a probationary phase remains unclear. Government records held by OPM reveal that as of March 2024, 217,000 employees had been on the job for less than a year, according to the latest available data.
Elon Musk, whom Trump has empowered to help decrease government expenditures through his Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE), asserted earlier this month that scrapping entire agencies is essential.
“I believe we need to eliminate entire agencies instead of simply holding on to many of them,” Musk declared during a video call to the World Governments Summit in Dubai, United Arab Emirates. “If we don’t eradicate the roots of the issue, it becomes easy for them to resurface.”
As of February 17, the Trump administration had terminated thousands of workers across various federal agencies following the expiration of the buyout acceptance period.
According to an internal email, 1,165 individuals employed at the National Institutes of Health were let go. Simultaneously, the union of Professional Aviation Safety Specialists reported that several hundred probationary employees had been terminated by the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA).
This report was contributed by The Associated Press.
