Trump fulfills promise to make it easier to fire federal workers

President Donald Trump is on the verge of fully implementing an order that will make it easier to fire tens of thousands of federal workers.

In his first term, Trump issued an executive order creating a federal job classification known as Schedule F, which would make it easier for federal officials to fire employees with that classification. But it was rescinded by his successor, President Joe Biden.

After Trump returned to the White House in January 2025, Trump issued a similar executive order, instructing the Office of Personnel Management — the federal agency that handles human resource issues for the government — to change the federal hiring process to focus on "merit" and eliminate diversity, equity and inclusion policies.

On Feb. 5, the Office of Personnel Management issued a final rule on the new employment category, called Schedule/Policy Career.

This rule, set to take effect March 9, will classify those employees' roles as "at-will positions," which means the employees can be terminated at any time and without specific reason, and make it more difficult for federal workers to fight their firing

The category covers policy-focused employees who are not presidential appointees. Traditionally, these positions have been considered nonpolitical and have had civil service protections, meaning that they could not be fired for political reasons and they could challenge their termination. But the new rule would remove these protections for an estimated 50,000 workers, OPM said. The president will decide which federal workers will be classified under the Schedule Policy/Career rules, with OPM recommending positions for inclusion. 

Under the rule, the president would issue an executive order to label a federal position in the new employment category, according to a memo. No such executive order has been issued yet. 

OPM says the new job category is part of a broader effort to implement a "merit hiring plan," focusing on recruiting less from what the federal government called "elite" universities and more from state schools, "religious colleges and universities, community colleges, high schools, trade and technical schools, homeschooling groups, faith-based groups, American Legion, 4-H youth programs, and the military, veterans, and law enforcement communities."

The new merit hiring plan also would ask applicants how they would "help advance the President's Executive Orders and policy priorities," a break from the government's longstanding practice of nonpartisanship in hiring.

This class of employees would lose protections, including notice of a firing beforehand, an opportunity to respond to a firing and the right to appeal a removal to the Merit Systems Protection Board, a federal agency tasked with considering challenges to firings of civil servants. 

OPM says the new rule "will allow agencies to quickly remove employees from critical positions who engage in misconduct, perform poorly, or obstruct the democratic process." 

Supporters of traditional civil service protections have criticized the changes.

"They're creating a system that in much more nefarious consequence will be enabling a loyalist regime, removing merit as the primary criteria for hiring or for performance review, and instituting a huge change that loyalty to the current president takes precedent over everything else, including the law and constitution," said Max Stier, the chief executive officer of the Partnership for Public Service, a nonprofit focused on improving government through democracy.

Stier's group published a study that found government at-will employment systems do not improve worker performance; to the contrary, the study found the systems can result in an increased risk of politicized firings unrelated to an employees' job performance. 

A federal district court judge put on hold a lawsuit filed by Public Employees for Environmental Responsibility and allied groups shortly after Trump issued his original executive order, saying the challenge could resume once the final rule published. That has now happened, and one of the groups has signaled it will continue the legal fight.

The final rule is set to take effect March 9, and a legal challenge is uncertain. For now, we rate this Promise Kept. 

Staff researcher Caryn Baird contributed to this report.