Government Worker Protections — Week of Mar 31, 2025

This week, the President signed an executive order removing collective bargaining rights from workers at most major federal agencies—including the State Department, Justice Department, Veterans Affairs, EPA, Treasury, Energy, and large parts of Homeland Security, HHS, Interior, Agriculture, and Commerce—by declaring that their primary work involves national security. Historically, this kind of designation was used only for intelligence agencies. A separate executive order targeted a specific law firm, WilmerHale, ordering agencies to suspend its employees' security clearances, end its government contracts, and refuse to hire anyone from the firm—citing concerns over the firm's past legal work, including its role in the Mueller investigation.

This might matter because collective bargaining rights and merit-based hiring are among the main protections that keep federal workers from being fired or punished for political reasons. The labor exclusion order could weaken these protections for hundreds of thousands of employees, potentially making it easier to replace experienced career staff with political loyalists. The WilmerHale order could set a precedent where a person's eligibility for federal employment depends on political associations rather than qualifications.

In Congress, lawmakers described other troubling patterns. A speech by Senator Whitehouse detailed how a career prosecutor in Washington, D.C., was forced out after warning that a politically motivated investigation lacked legal basis. A speech by Representative Kaptur reported that the Social Security Administration's deputy commissioner was removed after refusing to give the DOGE team access to Americans' personal data, and was replaced by someone already under investigation for sharing sensitive information with DOGE.

There are alternative explanations worth weighing. Most significantly, the President does have legal authority to designate agencies as national-security-related and remove them from collective bargaining—the question is whether applying it this broadly is an abuse of that power or a legitimate policy judgment. Courts will likely weigh in. The administration may also argue these measures are intended to improve government efficiency and address security or operational concerns across a broader range of agencies. The WilmerHale order could be characterized as a contracting decision to address conflicts of interest, though basing it on a firm's legal representations is unusual and raises First Amendment concerns. The congressional accounts come from opposition lawmakers and may not capture the full picture.

Limitations: This analysis is based on published government documents and congressional statements. Personnel decisions described by lawmakers have not been independently verified through this review. This is AI-generated analysis, not a finding of fact.