Federal agencies ordered to issue correction notices that firings weren't for performance reasons

SAN FRANCISCO (CN) — A federal judge ruled late Friday that federal probationary employees suffered an irreparable injury when the Office of Personnel Management directed federal agencies in February to terminate thousands of them using a template letter that falsely stated the terminations were for performance reasons.

Senior U.S. District Judge William Alsup, a Bill Clinton appointee, wrote in his order that losing one’s job was clearly an injury and that evidence shows that the terminations were a “total sham.”

In earlier orders, Alsup ruled that the office had no authority to tell federal agencies who to hire and fire and ordered the reinstatement of probationary employees. Later, the U.S. Supreme Court stayed the reinstatement of the employees — however, Alsup ruled that they still had standing.

“Termination under the false pretense of performance is an injury that will persist for the working life of each civil servant. In pursuing future employment, each will have to concede that they have been terminated based on performance. The stain created by OPM’s pretense will follow each employee through their careers and will limit their professional opportunities,” Alsup wrote.

Alsup also granted a narrowed preliminary injunction for the fired employees Friday, barring the office from issuing any further orders that tell other agencies to fire their employees.

He also determined that the employees that were fired with the template letter are to be sent a notice that their firing was not “performance based,” but was instead part of a government-wide mass termination effort.

The agencies have until May 8 to provide any employee falsely fired for performance with the notice.

“If a particular termination was in fact carried out after an individualized evaluation of that employee’s performance or fitness, the Chief Human Capital Officer (or equivalent) of that agency may instead submit, by MAY 8, 2025, AT NOON, a declaration, under oath and seal, stating so and providing the individual reasoning underpinning that termination,” Alsup wrote.

Counsel for the unions representing fired employees did not immediately respond to requests for comment. Counsel representing the government also did not immediately respond to requests for comment.

Alsup noted that nothing in his order will prevent a federal agency from firing a worker “so long as the agency makes that decision wholly on its own, does not use the OPM template termination notice, and is otherwise in compliance with applicable law.”

Alsup wrote that with the relief granted, the union plaintiffs can now no longer state that they are continuing to face irreparable organizational harms.

“Just as there is little to suggest that agencies are still acting at the behest of OPM, there is little on the record to suggest that the unions’ core business functions are still being frustrated by such terminations. Plaintiffs’ declarations attesting to such disruptions have by now grown stale,” Alsup wrote.

In the first hearing in the matter in February, Alsup granted the plaintiffs a temporary restraining order and said the mass firings were likely illegal and that the office has no authority to order agencies to hire or fire employees. He found the office can only give guidance and that the government’s argument that it was merely giving guidance could easily be seen as an order by the agencies.

The plaintiffs — unions joined by five nonprofit organizations that represent veterans, small businesses, parks and the environment — said in that hearing that Charles Ezell, acting director of the Office of Personnel Management, in a phone call on Feb. 14 ordered government agencies to use a template letter to terminate probationary employees that were not identified as “mission critical” by no later than the end of the day Feb. 17.

Alsup said he believed the government was obfuscating the truth when he granted the temporary restraining order and said that he was upset that Ezell refused to testify about exactly what happened in the Feb. 14 phone call.