Trump expected to move ahead with ‘Schedule F’; making it easier to cut federal workers

The Trump administration is moving ahead with a new rule, previously known as “Schedule F,” that will make it easier to remove federal employees it believes are undercutting President Trump‘s agenda.

Why it matters: By stripping civil service protections from about 50,000 people — roughly 2% of the federal work force — Trump is continuing his far-reaching effort to trim the federal bureaucracy and make it more answerable to him.

• The Office of Personnel Management’s new rule — dubbed “Schedule Policy/Career” — will allow many career civil servants to be classified as “at will” employees, making them easier to remove.
• Trump aides argue they need greater flexibility to fire civil servants who are underperforming, engaging in misconduct or undermining Trump’s policy plans.

Zoom in: Such civil servants in nonpartisan roles traditionally have had job protections that shielded them from the political whims of whoever was in the White House.

• But Trump and many of his backers have long believed that a “deep state” of Washington bureaucrats was undercutting his agenda.
• Toward the end of his first term, Trump signed an executive order establishing a Schedule F category for federal employees.
• President Biden rescinded the order after he took office, but after taking office again in January, Trump signed a new executive order reinstating and renaming it.

While he was out of office, Trump and his allies laid the groundwork for a new administration stocked with loyalists. Schedule F was a significant part of that plan

• Many of the Trump allies who pushed for Schedule F now have key roles in the administration, including Deputy Chief of Staff Stephen Miller and Management of Budget Director Russ Vought.
• “They are making decisions and those decisions should be in line with the president’s agenda. Unelected career bureaucrats should be held accountable to the agenda Americans vote for,” said a White House official.

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