Federal workers brace for more firings after judge lifts block on Trump administration job cuts
Good morning US politics readers. Federal workers are bracing for more mass firings after a federal judge ruled that the Trump administration can continue its job-cutting drive.
The ruling came as a blow to the National Treasury Employees Union (NTEU) and four other unions, who sued last week to block the administration from firing hundreds of thousands of federal workers and granting buyouts to employees who quit voluntarily.
The ruling by the US district judge Christopher Cooper in Washington DC federal court is temporary while the litigation plays out.
Meanwhile, as Trump and his lieutenants have been touting supposed cost-savings, a top labor lawyer has warned that instead the mass downsizing of the federal workforce could tally up into a “monumental” bill and could be breaking the law.
Officials have cited “poor performance” when terminating thousands of federal workers. In many cases it’s not true, according to employees embroiled in the blitz, many of whom are now seeking legal advice.
Jacob Malcom was acting deputy assistant secretary for policy and environmental management, and director of the office of policy analysis at the US Department of Interior – until this week, when he resigned in protest against the mass firings of probationary employees.
“This is being done under the guise of ‘poor performance’ or ‘skills not aligned with needs’ but neither are true,” he told the Guardian. “First, no evidence was provided that would suggest that poor performance; in fact, I know some of the individuals that were down my chain of supervision and know they were among the best performers.
You can read the full report by Michael Sainato here:
Here’s what’s happening today:
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Donald Trump is due to address national governors at 11am ET.
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CPAC continues apace. Speakers today include NSA chief Mike Waltz – who told Zelenskyy to “tone down” Trump criticism – at 9.55am, Sebastian Gorka at 11.05am, White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt at 5pm and homeland security secretary Kristi Noem at 7.30pm.
Key events
Further evidence has emerged that Donald Trump’s legally questionable government downsizing effort may not be the hit with voters that he hopes it will be.
A Washington Post-Ipsos poll found that a narrow majority of voters fear the president has grown too big for his britches:
President Donald Trump has opened his second term with a flurry of actions designed to radically disrupt and shrink the federal bureaucracy, but reviews from Americans are mixed to negative on many of his specific initiatives, and 57 percent say he has exceeded his authority since taking office, according to a Washington Post-Ipsos poll.
Overall, 43 percent of Americans say they support what the president has done during his first month in office, with 48 percent saying they oppose. Those who strongly oppose outnumber those who strongly support by 37 percent to 27 percent.
CNN and SSRS reported similar concerns among voters over Trump’s offensive against government agencies far and wide. His overall approval is dipping too, though he still remains more popular than during his first term:
There are signs in the poll, though, that the warmer welcome Trump has received this time around could be fleeting, as optimism about his return to office has slipped since December. A broad majority feel the president isn’t doing enough to address the high prices of everyday goods. And 52% say he’s gone too far in using his presidential power, with similar majorities wary of his push to shutter federal agencies and elevate Elon Musk to a prominent role in his efforts to reshape the government.
Americans divide on Trump’s performance in office thus far, with 47% approving and 52% disapproving, below the start-of-term ratings for any recent presidency other than his own. For most of the public, Trump’s actions are lining up with their expectations: Three-quarters say his handling of the presidency has been in line with what they expected while 25% say he’s handled it in an unexpected way, similar to how people felt a few weeks into his first term.
All told, 41% say both that Trump is handling the presidency as expected and that his living up to their expectations is a positive. Nearly all of those who feel caught off guard describe that as a bad thing, but the group who feels surprised in a bad way by Trump’s actions makes up only 21% of all Americans.
Most adults nationwide, 55%, say that Trump has not paid enough attention to the country’s most important problems and 62% feel he has not gone far enough in trying to reduce the price of everyday goods. Sizable shares across party lines share the latter view, including 47% of Republicans, 65% of independents and 73% of Democrats. In CNN’s January polling, the economy eclipsed all other issues as Americans’ top concern.
More describe themselves as pessimistic or afraid when looking ahead to the rest of Trump’s second term (54%) than say they feel enthusiastic or optimistic about it (46%). In December, 52% were on the positive side, 48% negative. Notably, the share saying they feel “afraid” has climbed 6 points to 35%, rising by a roughly equal share across partisan lines.
Senate Republicans approve budget that funds Trump’s mass deportations
The Senate’s Republican majority has passed a budget plan that will pay for Donald Trump’s mass deportations and other hardline immigration policies, the Associated Press reports.
The resolution, approved after a longer series of amendment votes that stretched all night on Thursday and into Friday morning, is the first step in Congress approving funding for one of Trump’s campaign planks. It comes in tandem with a plan moving through the House of Representatives, which the GOP also controls, to extend tax cuts enacted under Trump’s first term and make dramatic cuts to the federal social safety net.
Here’s more on the budget resolution, from the AP:
The hours-long “vote-a-rama” rambled along in a dreaded but crucial part of the budget process, as senators considered one amendment after another, largely from Democrats trying to halt it. But Republicans used their majority power to muscle the package to approval on a largely party-line vote, 52-48, with all Democrats and one GOP senator opposing it.
“What we’re doing today is jumpstarting a process that will allow the Republican Party to meet President Trump’s immigration agenda,” Senate Budget Committee chair Lindsey Graham, R-S.C., said while opening the debate.
Graham said President Donald Trump’s top immigration czar, Tom Homan, told senators that the administration’s deportation operations are “out of money” and need more funding from Congress to detain and deport immigrants.
With little power in the minority to stop the onslaught, Democrats instead used the all-night debate to force GOP senators into potentially embarrassing votes — including the first one, on blocking tax breaks to billionaires. It was turned back on procedural grounds. So were many others.
“This is going to be a long, drawn-out fight,” Senate Democratic Leader Chuck Schumer of New York warned. Hours later, Schumer said it “was only the beginning” of what could become a months-long debate.
The package is what Republicans view as a down payment on Trump’s agenda, part of a broader effort that will eventually include legislation to extend some $4.5 trillion in tax breaks and other priorities. That’s being assembled by House Speaker Mike Johnson in a separate budget package that also seeks up to $2 trillion in reductions to health care and other programs.
Over in Ohio, Republican congressman Troy Balderson told constituents that he was concerned about the scope of Donald Trump’s executive orders, particularly when it comes to doing away with federal agencies.
Balderson represents a very red district, but the Columbus Dispatch reports that he told voters Trump’s rapid pace of orders was “getting out of control” and undercutting responsibilities delegates to Congress. Here’s more:
Balderson, whose district includes the central and southeastern Ohio counties like Licking, Fairfield and parts of Delaware County, expressed some pushback to the idea of sole decision-making power lying with Trump and billionaire advisor Elon Musk.
“Congress has to decide whether or not the Department of Education goes away,” Balderson asserted. “Not the president, not Elon Musk. Congress decides.”
While the Zanesville native said he respects Trump and the need for executive orders, and that the executive branch has every right to look into government agencies like those dealing with education and Medicaid, “Congress has to do their work.”
Constituents in deep red Georgia district take Republican congressman to task over Doge cuts – report
Republican congressman Rich McCormick’s Georgia district voted for Donald Trump by a 60% margin last November, but many residents are not pleased with the president allowing the “department of government efficiency” to gut federal agencies.
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution reports that McCormick learned this the hard way last night, when he held a very well-attended town hall in which constituents aired their grievances over what they feared were haphazard and damaging cuts to programs that did not deserve to meet such a fate.
Here’s more:
The Suwanee Republican’s staff expected a robust turnout for his first town hall since Trump took office. But they seemed caught off guard by the massive crowd of hundreds that gathered outside Roswell City Hall.
Attendees set the tone early, with one accusing McCormick of “doing us a disservice” for supporting the budget-slashing initiatives by Elon Musk’s Department of Government Efficiency that have torn through all corners of federal government.
“You don’t think I’m going to stand up for you?” asked McCormick, as the crowd responded with loud boos.
Pressed on what he’ll do to “rein in the megalomaniac in the White House,” McCormick brought up President Joe Biden’s tenure.
“When you talk about tyranny, when you talk about presidential power, I remember having the same discussion with Republicans when Biden was elected.”
He then compared the attendees to “Jan. 6ers who are yelling just as loud as you” – a reference to the pro-Trump mob that attacked the U.S. Capitol. That triggered a fresh outburst from crowd members insulted by the comparison.
Pushed to answer the question, McCormick later added: “I don’t want to see any president be too powerful.”
We expect Britain’s prime minister Keir Starmer to soon visit Donald Trump, at a moment when the American president is upending much of US foreign policy with his embrace of Russia’s position in the war in Ukraine. The Guardian’s Patrick Wintour looks at whether Starmer’s visit might reassure a rattled Europe:
In November 1940, Winston Churchill sent a telegram to Franklin Roosevelt expressing relief both at the US president’s re-election and the victory of his anti-appeasement policy. “Things are afoot which will be remembered as long as the English language is spoken in any quarter of the globe, and in expressing the comfort I feel that the people of the United States have once again cast these great burdens upon you, I must now avow my sure faith that the lights by which we steer will bring us safely to anchor,” he wrote.
As Keir Starmer and Emmanuel Macron prepare to meet a very different US president, things are once again afoot that will live long in the memory – but this time the lights seem to be going out on a ship adrift in a sea of chaos.
In his Arsenal of Democracy speech, Roosevelt spurned those who asked to “throw the US weight on the scale in favour of a dictated peace”. He also saw past Nazi Germany’s “parade of pious purpose” to observe “in the background the concentration camps and ‘servants of God’ in chains”.
Thomas Graham
As Donald Trump swings his sights from one region to the next, upturning diplomatic relations and confounding allies, leaders of former US partners have clashed with him and come off much the worse.
But so far, one – Mexico’s Claudia Sheinbaum – has emerged relatively unscathed.
With the US-Mexico border and the trade, drugs and migrants that cross it a focus of the Trump administration, Mexico is under intense pressure. Yet while Sheinbaum has made some concessions, she has also charmed Trump and won plaudits at home, with approval ratings that touch 80%.
Oliver Milman
The Trump administration is stripping away support for scientific research in the US and overseas that contains a word it finds particularly inconvenient: “climate.”
The US government is withdrawing grants and other support for research that even references the climate crisis, academics have said, amid Donald Trump’s blitzkrieg upon environmental regulations and clean-energy development.
Trump, who has said that the climate crisis is a “giant hoax”, has already stripped mentions of climate change and global heating from government websites and ordered a halt to programs that reference diversity, equity and inclusion. A widespread funding freeze for federally backed scientific work also has been imposed, throwing the US scientific community into chaos.
Federal workers brace for more firings after judge lifts block on Trump administration job cuts
Good morning US politics readers. Federal workers are bracing for more mass firings after a federal judge ruled that the Trump administration can continue its job-cutting drive.
The ruling came as a blow to the National Treasury Employees Union (NTEU) and four other unions, who sued last week to block the administration from firing hundreds of thousands of federal workers and granting buyouts to employees who quit voluntarily.
The ruling by the US district judge Christopher Cooper in Washington DC federal court is temporary while the litigation plays out.
Meanwhile, as Trump and his lieutenants have been touting supposed cost-savings, a top labor lawyer has warned that instead the mass downsizing of the federal workforce could tally up into a “monumental” bill and could be breaking the law.
Officials have cited “poor performance” when terminating thousands of federal workers. In many cases it’s not true, according to employees embroiled in the blitz, many of whom are now seeking legal advice.
Jacob Malcom was acting deputy assistant secretary for policy and environmental management, and director of the office of policy analysis at the US Department of Interior – until this week, when he resigned in protest against the mass firings of probationary employees.
“This is being done under the guise of ‘poor performance’ or ‘skills not aligned with needs’ but neither are true,” he told the Guardian. “First, no evidence was provided that would suggest that poor performance; in fact, I know some of the individuals that were down my chain of supervision and know they were among the best performers.
You can read the full report by Michael Sainato here:
Here’s what’s happening today:
-
Donald Trump is due to address national governors at 11am ET.
-
CPAC continues apace. Speakers today include NSA chief Mike Waltz – who told Zelenskyy to “tone down” Trump criticism – at 9.55am, Sebastian Gorka at 11.05am, White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt at 5pm and homeland security secretary Kristi Noem at 7.30pm.
