President Trump has issued an executive order converting an estimated 8,000 federal workers—nearly all in the GS-15 level—into at-will employees who can be fired without cause. The move follows an OPM rule finalized in February creating a new at-will category
President Trump’s executive order takes aim at a specific slice of the federal workforce—about 8,000 people—turning them into employees who serve “at will,” meaning the government could fire them without providing any reason.
The order. issued by Trump. caps an effort the administration has pursued since his first term: stripping federal employees of civil service protections meant to insulate their jobs from political interference. Nearly all of the 8,000 positions affected sit at the highest civil service level, known as GS-15.
The administration says the jobs being moved are senior posts with significant influence over policy. The list includes leaders of policy offices and their chiefs of staff, heads of regional offices, program managers, senior public affairs officers, and those overseeing spending and grants.
The number in Wednesday’s order is smaller than the Office of Personnel Management had estimated could be reclassified. OPM had estimated that about 50,000 positions might be moved under the new framework, but the administration has not ruled out expanding the pool later.
Democracy Forward and other groups argue the change will reach far beyond personnel files. Skye Perryman, president of Democracy Forward, described the stakes in services the public depends on.
“ The people responsible for protecting our public health. safeguarding our environment. delivering our mail. managing our airports. protecting our public lands. and enforcing our laws should be allowed to do their jobs. not targeted by the same government they serve. ” Perryman said. “When government experts can be fired without cause. it’s not just federal workers who are harmed — it’s the people across the country who rely on these essential services every day.”.
Under the new arrangement, the administration argues, those reclassified will remain protected in key ways—just not in the same way. OPM Director Scott Kupor told reporters on Wednesday that the change is about more than personnel; it’s about how power flows.
“This is very much about accountability,” Kupor said. “It’s also about a restoration, in our mind, of the democratic process.”
He described the president as the person elected by the American people and argued that the employees who carry out policy must be willing to execute directives.
“This provides a mechanism, obviously, for people in those agencies to be able to be removed effectively at will,” Kupor said.
Kupor said the administration will not use loyalty tests. and he said Schedule Policy/Career employees will not lose their whistleblower protections. Federal law also prohibits them from being fired based on political affiliation. But he acknowledged the practical shift: agencies would enforce the legal limits. and the reclassified employees no longer have appeal rights.
It’s the friction between those promises and the consequences that has fueled years of legal fight. The broader idea that federal jobs should stay nonpartisan traces back about 140 years. Before the civil service protections Congress eventually enacted. federal jobs were often handed out to political friends and supporters—an approach that lawmakers associated with corruption and incompetence.
Then, in 1881, President James A. Garfield was shot and killed by a disgruntled and mentally ill jobseeker, and reforms accelerated. Congress later passed a series of laws meant to shield government work from political disruption and preserve continuity across administrations.
The Trump administration insists Wednesday’s order does not revive the spoils system. Kupor and others argue the hiring process for reclassified employees is unchanged. The administration also says the current structure lets rank-and-file workers block the president’s agenda.
But critics say the change will change behavior inside agencies—especially when career officials face the prospect of losing their jobs over news or warnings they share with political leadership.
Don Moynihan, a professor at the University of Michigan’s Ford School of Public Policy, said the politicization will deepen if the president can legally fire tens of thousands more workers for any reason.
“It creates bubbles around policymakers,” Moynihan said. “If you were a career civil servant and there is bad news that you want to share with the president, you’re less likely to do so if you think, ‘The minute I share that bad news, I’m going to get fired.’”
Moynihan said this isn’t theoretical. He pointed to examples involving political appointees—people already lacking civil service protections—who have raised the president’s ire.
He cited the firing of the head of the Defense Intelligence Agency after the agency issued a preliminary report last year that contradicted Trump’s assessment that U.S. airstrikes had “completely and totally obliterated” Iran’s nuclear enrichment facilities. Moynihan also pointed to the commissioner of the Bureau of Labor Statistics. who had served as a career economist in the government for more than two decades. saying the commissioner was ridiculed and then replaced by Trump after a disappointing jobs report.
This is not just a political dispute over how the federal government should be run; it has become a case with a likely end point in the courts. Moynihan believes ongoing litigation is one reason the administration started by reclassifying only a comparatively small number of positions.
He wrote on his blog in February that the administration is more likely to win lawsuits if it begins with “more defensible policy-making roles.” Once the rule is upheld, he said, officials could broaden its reach deeper into the administration.
Moynihan predicts the Supreme Court will ultimately decide the issue.
“This is a swing-for-the-fences moment on the part of the administration. where they look at this Supreme Court and think this is the most friendly court that we are going to get on this topic. ” Moynihan said. pointing to emergency orders issued by the Supreme Court last year that allowed controversial firings to stand while litigation continued.
The administration’s view, Moynihan said, is that Article II of the Constitution gives the president full control over the executive branch, including over positions Congress designed to be insulated from White House control.
During oral arguments late last year, the conservative majority appeared open to overturning a 90-year precedent limiting presidential power to fire the heads of independent agencies. Chief Justice John Roberts said that precedent was “a dried husk.” A decision is expected soon.
Not everyone agrees the administration’s goal is efficiency rather than control. Kupor has argued that giving the president more authority over the workforce will produce a more efficient government. In a blog post, he compared federal management to how private organizations operate.
“Outside of the federal government. all other organizations — whether for-profit or non-profit — are led by a CEO. who sets the priorities for the organization and ultimately effects those priorities through the hiring of employees who are accountable to the CEO’s mission. ” Kupor wrote. “Everyone knows what is expected of them and is accountable to the goals of the organization.”.
Michael Martinez, a former OPM deputy general counsel now on the legal team at Democracy Forward, said the comparison misses what government work actually is.
“It’s mission-driven work in government,” Martinez said. “That’s really for the American people, so that they can rely on the information they’re getting” — whether it’s the latest jobs numbers or the weather report.
Moynihan said studies he referenced point in the opposite direction as politicization rises.
“As systems become more politicized, performance of public institutions drops,” he said. “That’s partly because people who have expertise decide, ‘I’m not going to stick around if the input that I provide to policymakers is going to be ignored.’”
He also argued that the federal government’s recruiting advantage has historically been the promise candidates could make a difference.
“But if your input and work are just being ignored, that’s a much harder sales pitch to make to potential employees,” he said.
For now. the administration is starting with a narrower set of jobs—about 8. 000 GS-15 positions—using Wednesday’s executive order to convert them into at-will roles under the new Schedule Policy/Career category created by an OPM rule finalized in February. But the political fight, and the legal timetable it implies, is already set.
Trump executive order federal workers civil service at-will GS-15 Schedule Policy/Career OPM Scott Kupor Democracy Forward lawsuits Supreme Court Article II civil service protections