Others include plans to revive reforms introduced when Trump was president, known as Schedule F, to move federal workers in policy-orientated roles to a new employment category under which the usual civil service protections would not apply. Though it has virtually no chance of passing through the Democrat-controlled Congress, the draft legislation is the latest attempt by Republicans to rewrite the rules of civil service employment.
The bill would mean that the only way officials who had been dismissed could appeal the decision would be to raise it with the manager who had fired them, except in cases of alleged discrimination, which would continue to be referred to the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission. Read more: Trump moves to extend hire-and-fire powers over civil service Former President Trump is absolutely right about this: there needs to be a reckoning, and bureaucrats actually need to be fireable.” He added: “That is because policies meant to insulate the government from politics have instead created a dense web of red tape that rewards laziness and noncompliance and enables hostile partisans to entrench themselves within federal agencies. It also has been published just days after it emerged that former president Donald Trump – who took steps to control the bureaucracy and fired several high-profile officials during his time in office – was overseeing plans to purge tens of thousands of career civil servants should he be re-elected in 2024.Ĭhip Roy, a Texan representative who is one of the five behind the bill, said that “most career civil servants do their jobs faithfully day in and day out”, but claimed “there are still too many federal employees actively undermining America through their blatant contempt for our nation, the rule of law, and the American people”. The bill is unlikely to pass the current Democrat-controlled House of Representatives, but comes ahead of mid-term elections in November that could see the Republicans take back control of the lower chamber. The legislation, which has been proposed by five Republican representatives, would dampen whistleblower activity and seek to abolish the Merit Systems Protection Board, which protects the federal government against political practices, as well as reducing employment protections.
Photo by Gage Skidmore via FlickrĪ group of US lawmakers from the Republican Party have introduced a bill that would make it easier for the president to remove a host of nonpartisan officials from their roles, in what one called a “reckoning” for feds. "Former president Trump is absolutely right about this: there needs to be a reckoning, and bureaucrats actually need to be fireable,” representative Chip Roy said.