- The Trump administration's Office of Personnel Management announced a new rule that reclassifies tens of thousands of federal workers as "at-will" employees, subject to termination by the president for any reason, affecting up to 50,000 workers and surpassing Ronald Reagan's mass firing of 11,300 air traffic controllers in 1981.
- Since returning to the White House, Trump has overseen the departure of over 300,000 federal workers through involuntary terminations, voluntary buyouts, early retirements, and attrition, with 24,000 employees already terminated in the first year of his second term, and 370,000 workers at the Department of Veterans Affairs and EPA stripped of collective bargaining rights.
- The new rule is part of a broader effort to consolidate power in the executive branch, allowing Trump to fire federal workers who resist presidential orders, with ICE being transformed into a paramilitary force operating under the direct control of the executive branch, sparking concerns about the erosion of democracy and the potential for a dictatorship, as noted by The Economist, which warns that ICE can be deployed "pretty much anywhere with impunity, including during elections."
JUSTICE MATTERS
World Socialist Web Site and NPR differ in their framing of the story, with World Socialist Web Site using phrases like "purge the federal government" and "threat of dictatorship", while NPR uses more neutral language such as "easier for Trump to fire federal workers". This difference in wording obscures the systemic context and implications of the rule, as World Socialist Web Site highlights the potential for "an unaccountable dictatorship" and the erosion of civil service protections, whereas NPR focuses on the individual impact on federal employees without exploring the broader consequences. By using phrases like "Improving Performance, Accountability and Responsiveness", NPR quotes the rule's title, which downplays the significance of the change and omits the historical context and potential motivations behind the rule.
Cross-referenced with: NPR
EPSTEIN FILES NOTE
Donald Trump appeared in flight logs, black book, emails, and photos released by the DOJ.
