Supreme Court ruling threatens civil service jobs for workers

The Supreme Court’s decision in Margolin v. National Association of Immigration Judges includes a separate opinion that would make it far easier for the Trump administration to strip federal civil servants of employment protections—by arguing that when the Mer

Federal workers spent months wondering who would still be there on the other side of a change in power. For many. the uncertainty wasn’t theoretical—it came after the Trump administration’s early efforts to reshape government staffing. including the abrupt spread of chaos associated with the “government efficiency” project that fired tens of thousands of federal employees before it all but vanished.

Now, the court fight over those broader shakeups has entered a new and sharper phase.

On Tuesday, the Supreme Court handed down its decision in Margolin v. National Association of Immigration Judges. On its face. the case is about a narrower question: whether federal immigration judges have a First Amendment right to give public speeches about immigration law. But the full Court disposed of the matter using a procedural approach that the decision treats as decisive.

What followed, though, is what is landing like bad news in offices across the federal workforce.

Justice Clarence Thomas wrote a separate opinion joined by Justice Amy Coney Barrett that would. in practice. make it easier for the president to strip federal civil servants of employment protections. The thrust of Thomas’s argument is that Trump could remove those protections by firing the officials who lead the process used to adjudicate civil service disputes—leaving workers without enforceable rights.

Barrett’s willingness to join Thomas’s position matters because she is generally viewed as closer to the center of the GOP-controlled Court. Thomas, by contrast, is known for taking extreme stances. If Barrett endorses Thomas’s “neat trick” for collapsing the boundary between agency leaders and ordinary civil servants. it signals that a wider majority may agree.

The legal theory at the center of the dispute is the “unitary executive,” a concept long supported by Republican judges. It holds that the president must have the power to fire high-ranking government officials who lead federal agencies. Historically. however. unitary executive arguments have not been understood to eliminate employment protections for civil servants and other relatively low-ranking federal employees.

In Thomas’s separate opinion, that distinction is treated differently. The argument assumes that Trump can effectively reach ordinary federal workers by targeting the officials who adjudicate employment disputes tied to civil service law. With those decision-makers removed, Thomas and Barrett suggest civil servants would lose the protections that those laws otherwise provide.

The stakes of that view are amplified by how much civil service protections rely on a functioning administrative dispute system. Modern civil service rules—signed into law after the era of political patronage—were built to prevent federal staffing from collapsing every time the White House changed hands.

Federal civil service reform began in earnest after President James A. Garfield was assassinated. As Candice Millard wrote. when Garfield took office. the line of job seekers hoping to secure a federal job began forming before he even sat down to breakfast. By the time Garfield had finished his meal. the line “snaked down the front walk. out the gate. and onto Pennsylvania Avenue.” As president. Garfield was expected to meet each of these job seekers and place them into jobs based on politically powerful patronage.

That system. Millard’s account makes clear. was both inefficient and corrupting: it forced the federal government to replace much of its workforce with each election. diverted enormous attention into low-level hiring. encouraged favors tied to senators. congressmen. and other influential patrons. and made it harder to recruit specialized experts.

The Pendleton Civil Service Reform Act, signed by President Chester A. Arthur in 1883, was meant to end that churn—so that federal jobs would not be doled out wholesale depending on who won the presidency.

Today’s protections also include limits on coercing civil servants into political activity, along with whistleblower protections, and a structural aim: continuity and professional staffing across presidential administrations.

At the center of enforcement is an agency known as the Merit Systems Protection Board, or MSPB. Federal civil servants who believe their rights have been violated typically file their disputes there first. The MSPB is able to adjudicate cases and prevent employment protections from being purely theoretical.

But in the early days of his second presidency, Trump took actions that appeared aimed at shutting down the MSPB. The administration fired one of the board’s members, depriving the MSPB of the quorum it needed to operate. It also fired Special Counsel of the United States Hampton Dellinger. an official who investigates alleged violations of civil service laws and brings cases to the MSPB. Trump then attempted to replace Dellinger with a far-right podcaster.

Later, Trump took steps that appeared designed to reinvigorate the board. The MSPB now has two members—the minimum needed to operate. The podcaster withdrew from consideration after Politico reported that the podcaster said he has a “Nazi streak in me from time to time.” Trump later assigned Dellinger’s duties to U.S. Trade Representative Jamieson Greer.

Even with the MSPB functioning at the bare minimum for now, the early months of the second Trump administration were different. For a period, the MSPB had only one member and could not adjudicate civil service disputes at all.

That brings the discussion back to the Margolin dispute over what happens when the MSPB is defunct.

The most consequential issue in Margolin is what should happen if Trump never appointed a second MSPB member and left the board inoperative.

A federal appeals court. the United States Court of Appeals for the Fourth Circuit. decided Margolin in June 2025. during the period when the MSPB was defunct. The Fourth Circuit suggested that if the MSPB can’t function. the federal judiciary should step in to hear civil service disputes that otherwise would go to the MSPB—because if it didn’t. civil service laws would cease to function.

On Tuesday, the full Supreme Court reversed the Fourth Circuit on narrow grounds. In its opinion, the full Court said the Fourth Circuit should not have reached the question of what happens when the MSPB is defunct because the plaintiffs in Margolin did not raise that issue in their briefs.

Thomas’s concurring opinion—and the part Barrett joined—rejects the Fourth Circuit’s approach outright. Thomas argues that federal law requires civil servants to bring their employment disputes in the MSPB, and that if there is no MSPB, they are simply out of luck.

In practical terms, that is what would change for federal workers. With two MSPB members currently in place. the suggestion in Thomas and Barrett’s framing is that Trump could gain power over federal employment by firing one of the two members. If the MSPB stops functioning. civil servants could be cut off from legal remedies—even if they were illegally fired for being Democrats.

The decision’s direction also echoes earlier signals from the Supreme Court’s Republican majority. Last July, in McMahon v. New York (2025), the Court permitted the Trump administration to fire about half of the Department of Education’s workforce. The Court’s three Democrats dissented, but the Republican justices in the majority did not explain their decision. It was issued on the Court’s shadow docket, a track in which justices often do not provide reasoning.

Taken together, Margolin’s outcome on Tuesday and Barrett’s decision to join Thomas’s view suggest a Court that is increasingly skeptical of the idea that civil service protections should remain enforceable even when political control changes.

Barrett’s move suggests that the Supreme Court wants to tear down a consensus reached in 1883—that the federal government should have a professional civil service that cannot be removed simply because the Republican Party controls the White House.

For civil servants trying to do their jobs, the procedural path of Tuesday’s decision may look tidy on paper. But the separate opinion—joined by Barrett—lands on the ground where employment protections are supposed to matter most: whether a worker who believes they were fired illegally has somewhere to take the fight. and whether the system will still be there when power decides to move.

Supreme Court Margolin v. National Association of Immigration Judges civil service protections Merit Systems Protection Board MSPB Amy Coney Barrett Clarence Thomas federal workers