Federal Workers Sue Trump Administration Over Schedule F Executive Order

Amid a flurry of executive orders President Donald Trump signed in the first few hours of retaking the White House is one that strips employment protections for tens of thousands of federal workers.

The EO — known as “Schedule F” when he signed it at the tail end of his first presidency — reclassifies the employment status of tens of thousands of civil service employees, essentially putting them in a less-protected employment class that makes it easier to dismiss them for political disloyalty. The reimplementation of Schedule F was one part of a larger EO Trump signed that impacts the federal workforce. It also includes a hiring freeze, a 5-days-a-week return to office mandate and changes in hiring practices.

Though the EO says that federal employees “are not required to personally or politically support the current President or the policies of the current administration,” they are “required to faithfully implement administration policies to the best of their ability, consistent with their constitutional oath and the vesting of executive authority solely in the President.” The EO makes it clear that if any employee doesn’t do this, it’s “grounds for dismissal.”

The reintroduction of Schedule F has been a top concern since Trump was elected in November. Project 2025, the Heritage Foundation’s sprawling blueprint for an authoritarian second Trump administration, called for a reintroduction of Schedule F as one of the new administration’s first actions. “Everything about it is very concerning,” Jacqueline Simon, the public policy director of the American Federation of Government Employees (AFGE), told Democracy Docket in November. “We could sit here all day talking about what is concerning, but I think that federal employees are concerned, not only for their own jobs, but also for the work that their agencies do, and that they know American people rely upon.”

“This unprecedented assertion of executive power will create an army of sycophants beholden only to Donald Trump, not the Constitution or the American people,” AFGE National President Everett Kelley said in a statement. “The integrity of the entire federal government could be irreparably harmed if this is not stopped.”

Shortly after Trump signed the EO, the National Treasury Employees Union (NTEU) — another government union that represents workers from 37 federal agencies — filed a lawsuit to reverse the order, claiming that it is “contrary to congressional intent.”

In a statement, NTEU president Doreen Greenwald said that Trump’s order “is about administering political loyalty tests to everyday employees in the federal workforce who took an oath to uphold the Constitution and serve their country.”

The NTEU sued the first Trump administration over Schedule F in 2020, but the lawsuit was dropped when former President Joe Biden took office and rescinded the order.