The Interior Department had told the court that it was planning RIFs in about 60 “competitive areas" and around 2,000 employees, but said that they should not be subject to the order because planning had begun prior to the shutdown. Image: Mark Gomez/Shutterstock.com
By: FEDweek StaffA federal judge has enforced a broad reading of her earlier order temporarily stopping RIFs linked to the partial government shutdown, saying it applies as well to any notices of pending layoffs issued since September 30, even if they had been in the planning stages before then.
The “clarifying” order by Judge Susan Illston of the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of California came as some three dozen departments and agencies affected by the temporary restraining order she initially issued began reporting to the court on their compliance with that order.
An initial assessment had shown that the order halted layoffs of more than 4,000 employees who had received, or were about to receive, RIF notices. Some of those notices have since been rescinded.
The Interior Department had told the court that it was planning RIFs in about 60 “competitive areas,” potentially involving a later-reported estimate of 2,000 employees, but asserted that they should not be subject to the order because planning had “begun long before the current lapse in appropriations and had nothing to do with the lapse in appropriations.”
The judge disagreed, though, writing in the new order that the ban “applies to any RIF notices issued on or after October 1, 2025 and before the end of the federal government shutdown, regardless of whether that RIF was planned to occur independent of or before the shutdown.”
The order also states that the order applies to union bargaining units regardless of two Trump administration orders to revoke union representation in nearly two dozen agencies, “the effect of which is the subject of legal dispute.”
Judge Illston also granted a motion to bring into the pending suit several unions—NFFE, SEIU, and NAGE—in addition to the primary sponsors, the AFGE and AFSCME unions.
The order further lists these departments and agencies as affected: Agriculture, Commerce, Defense (also called War), Education, Energy, HHS, DHS, HUD, Justice, Interior, Labor, State, Treasury, Transportation, and VA, as well as the CPSC, EPA, EEOC, FTC, GSA, Institute of Museum and Library Services, NASA, NARA, NEA, NEH, National Gallery of Art, NSF, NTSB, NRC, SBA, Smithsonian Institute, SSA and the International Development Finance Corporation.
In terms of procedure, the next step would be a hearing on a potential permanent injunction while the case proceeds on the unions’ argument that a shutdown does not provide the needed basis for conducting RIFs. The Trump administration is considered likely to appeal; such appeals have been successful in many, but not all, challenges to court orders against various federal personnel policy directives.
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