President Trump greets Chief Justice John G. Roberts, Jr. as he arrives to address to a joint session of Congress at the Capitol 04 March 2025. Image: WIN MCNAMEE/POOL/EPA-EFE/Shutterstock
By: FEDweek StaffThe Trump administration has asked the U.S. Supreme Court to block a lower court’s order requiring federal agencies to rehire probationary employees fired en masse recently, saying “The district court’s extraordinarily overbroad remedy is now inflicting ongoing, irreparable harm on the Executive Branch that warrants this Court’s urgent intervention.”
The Justice Department asked the high court to stay a ruling by District Judge William Alsup of the U.S. District Court for Northern California pending the department’s appeal to the Ninth Circuit federal court of appeals. That court had denied a similar request last week on a 2-1 split decision.
Alsup’s injunction required the departments of Veterans Affairs, Agriculture, Defense, Energy, Interior, and Treasury to stop the firings of probationary employees and to offer reinstatement to those fired on or around February 13 and 14, when mass layoffs occurred there.
Separately, District Judge James Bredar of the U.S. District Court for the District of Maryland has issued a temporary restraining order against a broader range of agencies. That decision notably excluded DoD, the largest agency, but reached back to the start of the Trump administration. A hearing is upcoming on whether to turn that initial order into a permanent injunction, as did Judge Alsup.
Both judges have ruled that the layoffs effectively were a reduction-in-force targeting probationary employees that was ordered by OPM even though it has no such authority; that agencies failed to follow RIF procedures in the layoffs; and that by using boilerplate language regarding the employees’ performance, they failed to give the employees the required notice of specific performance issues required when firing even probationary employees.
Federal agencies affected by the orders meanwhile have been giving status reports to both courts regarding their compliance with the orders—in many cases initially putting affected employees on paid administrative leave.
The Defense Department for example most recently reported to Judge Alsup that around February 13-14 it separated 364 probationers, of whom 65 have been reinstated or at least notified of their eligibility. “The remainder are pending notification, declined to accept the offer of reinstatement, or requested additional time to consider the offer,” it said.
That declaration further said the firings were done “in light of recent OPM guidance,” even as the Justice Department motion to the high court asserts—as it has in the lower courts—that the layoffs were done at the discretion of individual agencies, not under orders from OPM.
The motion also points out that since Alsup’s initial order, OPM retroactively revised the late January memo that started the process—by telling agencies to compile a list of their probationary employees—to say OPM was not directing layoffs. It however does not challenge the evidence Alsup cited from agency officials that the firings were in fact ordered by OPM, except to assert that agency officials “wrongly believed” that to be the case.
Also as in the lower courts, the Justice Department asserted that the disputes should not be in federal courts at all but rather should be channeled through the MSPB and FLRA appeals processes.
The trial judges had ruled that to be the case for federal union plaintiffs but said that other plaintiffs did have standing in federal court—in the San Francisco case, a number of interest groups, and in the Maryland case, a group of state attorneys general.
The motion also calls the lower court’s order an improper intrusion by the Judicial Branch into the inner workings of the Executive Branch, and says “the ensuing financial costs and logistical burdens of ongoing compliance efforts are immense.”
The next step at the high court will be a response from the plaintiffs in the San Francisco case.
Large Share of Federal Workforce about to Experience a Payless Pay Period
OPM Details Coverage Changes, Plan Dropouts for FEHB/PSHB in 2026
OMB Says Federal Workforce RIFs are Starting as Shutdown Drags On
Financial Impact of Shutdown Starts to Hit Home; WH Threatens No Back Pay
Surge of Retirement Applications Is in the Pipeline, Says OPM
See also,
TSP Takes Step toward Upcoming In-Plan Roth Conversions
5 Steps to Protect Your Federal Job During the Shutdown
Over 30K TSP Accounts Have Crossed the Million Mark in 2025
The Best Ages for Federal Employees to Retire
