Judge Rejects Bid to Stop Mass Firing of Probationary Employees!
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A federal judge has denied labor unions’ request to temporarily block the Trump administration from executing mass firings of probationary employees and deferred resignation offers. The judge ruled that the court “likely lacks subject matter jurisdiction” and directed the unions to take their case to the Federal Labor Relations Authority (FLRA).
Judge Christopher Cooper stated in his ruling that under the Federal Service Labor-Management Relations Statute (FSLMRS), challenges must first go through the FLRA before seeking judicial review in the courts of appeals.
The decision follows a hearing where five federal unions, including the National Treasury Employees Union (NTEU), argued that the urgency and scale of the firings justified taking the matter directly to court. However, the judge ruled that while court review may be more expedient, the unions failed to prove they had a right to bypass the FLRA process.
This lawsuit is one of several legal challenges against the Trump administration’s large-scale federal workforce reductions. The suit alleges that the administration’s mass firings and deferred resignation offers, impacting over 2 million federal employees, violate congressional authority and federal workforce reduction procedures.
The lawsuit argued that the Executive Branch acting as a “woodchipper for bureaucracy” clashes with Congress’s authority to create, fund, and set missions for federal agencies.
The unions, representing hundreds of thousands of federal employees across multiple agencies, sought a temporary restraining order against the Trump administration. They claimed the mass workforce reduction would result in a “critical” loss of union revenue and weaken their bargaining power.