The Trump administration on Thursday issued a rule that would reclassify roughly 50,000 senior career staffers into a new category, making it easier to fire them.
The rule allows agencies to move federal employees involved in policy into "at-will" positions-meaning they can be fired at will at any time, for any reason, except for illegal ones-which do not carry the same job protections as other career roles. About 2% of the federal workforce would be affected.
The move exacerbates fears that the Trump administration is trying to remove experienced, impartial civil servants in favor of dedicated political loyalists who will do whatever the administration wants, regardless of rules, propriety, or possible illegality. Critics of President Donald Trump say that his appointments elevate blind loyalty to him personally over competence and their legal duty to uphold the US Constitution.
Federal worker unions and advocates have raised concerns that the rules change would strip these employees of the right to appeal disciplinary actions or terminations before an independent body.
The administration explicitly cited these goals in creating the new classification, called Schedule Policy/Career.
"Agency supervisors report great difficulty removing employees for poor performance or misconduct," it said.
The new category "will allow agencies to quickly remove employees from critical positions who engage in misconduct, perform poorly, or obstruct the democratic process by intentionally subverting Presidential directives."
The rule is based on an executive order that Trump signed on his first day in office last year.
It revives a similar policy from shortly before the 2020 election, which created a category for federal employees involved in policy called Schedule F. That earlier order was quickly reversed by President Joe Biden, who in 2024 implemented a new rule that strengthened protections for career federal workers.
The new rule, which overturns the 2024 protections, prompted immediate threats of legal action from a coalition of more than 30 unions and advocacy groups, who had already challenged Trump's 2025 executive order in court.
Last year, soon after Trump took office, billionaire Elon Musk was empowered to carry out a massive purge of hundreds of thousands of federal employees. Many said they were fired for unspecified reasons, or for alleged performance issues, though their performance reviews to date had all been positive.
Some won back their positions through court challenges, but overall, some 12% of the US civilian federal government workforce got their walking papers, according to a New York Times analysis.
