The Trump administration is rolling out a plan to make fired federal employees no longer able to appeal their firing
Donald Trump Photo: CNP/ADM / Capital pictures / Profimedia
The Trump administration is trying to make it harder for laid-off federal employees to challenge their firings, according to a government plan released Monday, by limiting their right to appeal the decision to an independent board.
The Office of Personnel Management, the federal government's human resources office, has proposed eliminating the right of fired federal employees to appeal layoffs to the independent Merit Systems Protection Board, according to the plan.
Instead, laid-off workers should appeal to OPM, an office whose director reports to US President Donald Trump. If the proposal is implemented, it would build on Trump's previous efforts to reduce the size of the federal government, notes Agerpres.
Trump has made massive layoffs of government employees a centerpiece of his second term.
At the same time, he has undermined the avenues through which those same employees can challenge their firing, including by firing members of government offices that enforce job protections for federal employees, Reuters also writes.
The Merit Systems Protection Board, the organization named in Monday's proposal, mediates disputes between federal employees and their employers. The council has seen an increase in new cases since Trump took office for a second term. The council's caseload rose by 266% between October 1, 2024 and September 30, 2025, according to government data, compared to the same period the previous year.
OPM's proposal would “give the administration free rein to lay off huge segments of the federal workforce without meaningful independent oversight,” said Everett Kelley, president of the American Federation of Government Employees, the largest U.S. federal employee union.
OPM Director Scott Kupor said late last year that the US government had laid off 317,000 federal employees in 2025. Kupor told Reuters that only a fraction of those who left were fired, with most choosing to accept a contract buyout or go on their own. Reuters notes that it could not independently verify the accuracy of Kupor's statement.
OPM will be fair and impartial when handling complaints from fired federal employees, said McLaurine Pinover, a spokeswoman for the office.
The goal is to provide employees with “timely corrections when errors occur,” she said, adding that agencies should be able to “restructure themselves responsibly and fairly.”
