Federal judge orders reinstatement of workers at multiple agencies, unions say
A federal district court judge ordered the reinstatement of probationary workers fired from several agencies Thursday in a move that broadens relief he granted in a previous order, according to unions and organizations who brought the case.
During a hearing, Judge William Alsup of the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of California granted and further extended a temporary restraining order against the Office of Personnel Management and acting Director Charles Ezell, per a statement from the American Federation of Government Employees, American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees, and other plaintiffs.
“AFGE is pleased with Judge Alsup’s order to immediately reinstate tens of thousands of probationary federal employees who were illegally fired from their jobs by an administration hellbent on crippling federal agencies and their work on behalf of the American public,” Everett Kelley, AFGE’s national president, said in a statement included in the release.
That order includes the Departments of Veterans Affairs, Agriculture, Interior, Energy, Defense, and Treasury. Alsup also prohibited OPM from giving guidance to agencies on employee terminations and asked the agencies to provide notice of their compliance to the court, the unions’ statement said. Per the court docket, a written memorandum order is forthcoming.
Alsup’s ruling comes after he granted a previous temporary restraining order that provided limited relief to workers at several agencies: VA, DOD, National Parks Service, Bureau of Land Management, Small Business Administration, and U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service. In that ruling, Alsup found that OPM’s original memo to agencies on federal probationary workers and its other related efforts likely unlawfully directed the firing of those agency workers.
