Judge blocks shutdown layoffs of federal workers

SAN FRANCISCO (CN) — A federal judge on Wednesday temporarily blocked the Trump administration from firing federal employees during the government shutdown.

U.S. District Judge Susan Illston issued a bench ruling granting a temporary restraining order requested by unions representing federal workers, who claim that the government is unlawfully terminating federal employees during the shutdown.

“The evidence suggests the OMB and OPM have taken advantage of lapse of government funding to assume that all bets are off, that the law does not apply to them anymore, and that they can impose the structures that they like on the government situation that they don’t like. I believe the plaintiffs will demonstrate what is going on here is illegal and in excess of authority and is arbitrary and capricious,” the Bill Clinton appointee said.

Illston temporarily prohibited the government from taking any action to issue reduction-in-force, or RIF, notices to federal employees during or because of the government shutdown. She also barred the government from implementing RIF notices already issued beginning on Oct. 10.

The order is effective immediately. A hearing for preliminary injunction is scheduled for Oct. 28.

In a statement, Danielle Leonard of Altshuler Berzon, an attorney for the plaintiffs, said that the ruling is the “first step in the unions’ fight for justice.”

“There is nothing remotely lawful about this administration’s choice to force federal employees to work during a government shutdown to terminate their fellow public servants, all to serve political aims and justified by the false premise that the shutdown eliminates statutory authorization,” she said.

A representative for the Department of Justice declined to comment.

The unions filed a lawsuit against the Trump administration the day before the shutdown started, claiming that it had made “unlawful threats” to terminate federal employees if a shutdown occurred.

A week and a half into the shutdown, the plaintiffs on Oct. 10 requested the court issue an emergency order blocking the government from mass terminations in response to Office of Management and Budget Director Russell Vought’s posting on social media that “The RIFs have begun.”

Illston opened the hearing by reading a series of public statements made by Trump administration officials that she says demonstrate how the terminations are politically motivated, including multiple statements from Trump blaming Democrats for the shutdown and stating that RIF notices will be “Democrat-oriented.”

“You can’t do that in a nation of laws. We have laws here, and the things articulated here are not within the law, it exceeds it, bends it, breaks it, and needs to be enjoined,” she said.

An estimated 4,100 federal employees have received RIF notices since Oct. 1, according to an amended court document filed Tuesday by Stephen Billy, a senior advisor at OMB.

At the Department of Health and Human Services, around 1,760 employees received RIF notices, despite the department only intending to send notices to 982 employees, according to internal documents.

Illston scolded the government for the errors they had made in implementing RIF notices, citing issues with federal employees not getting RIF notices because they can’t access their work email during the shutdown, employees who were sent RIF notices by human resources staff who were also furloughed by the shutdown, and pregnant employees unsure how to navigate health insurance coverage without guidance.

“What it is is a situation where things are being done before they are thought through. It’s ready, fire, aim. It has a human cost, which is really why we are here today. Human cost cannot be tolerated,” she said.

The plaintiffs argue that issuing RIF notices during a government shutdown is unlawful because they require federal employees to plan and implement and such actions are not legally allowed to happen during a shutdown.

“Decisions have already been made. We know it. The president, OMB, they have all said, ‘We are doing it!’ They have already made the decision on what agencies are RIF-ing on Friday. Someone has to prepare them, probably as we speak, without being paid. It’s illegal and they are refusing to tell the court where that is happening,” Leonard said.

Leonard argued the court should block all RIF notices across all agencies named in the lawsuit, arguing that there is no record of exactly how many RIFs have occurred and what agencies they have reached.

“It is absolutely appropriate without further information from the government and what the president was talking about, what OMB is talking about, with continuing the RIFs? Where? Without further information, the court has the ability to enjoin further RIFs,” she said.

Illston additionally ordered the government to file a brief with information on all RIFs, actual and imminent, within two business days.

Department of Justice attorney Elizabeth Hedges said she was not prepared to speak on the merits of the case; instead, she argued that the court does not have jurisdiction and that a federal labor board is the proper venue to hear the case.

“You are not making any statement on the government’s position on the merits of this, whether these RIFs are legal?” Illston asked.

Hedges responded: “Not today.”

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