Updated
Workforce
As USDA relocation deadlines near, employees say questions remain unanswered
Employees say they still lack key details about exemptions, moving costs and next steps as USDA continues issuing relocation notices.
Workforce
Federal employees say they’ll quit if they have to move to New Jersey
A bipartisan group of lawmakers is urging the Trump administration to reconsider the planned move of local offices of the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers.
Workforce
Unions ask for injunction restoring collective bargaining at Defense
The latest filing from a pair of federal employee unions highlights the ways in which the Pentagon strayed from the Trump administration’s own guidance for implementing the president’s executive order banning collective bargaining at most agencies on national security grounds.
Workforce
OPM shrinks its workforce by a third, seeks further staffing cuts
The agency is giving employees in its healthcare and insurance division another shot at opting into the deferred resignation program.
Workforce
Arbitrator restores telework for IRS workers
The Internal Revenue Service withdrew from participating in the National Treasury Employees Union’s grievance against the agency for its 2025 return-to-office push in March, forcing independent arbitrator Christopher Shulman to conduct proceedings with management in absentia.
Workforce
Pentagon closes cyber apprenticeship applications early after receiving over 15,000
A Defense Department official told Nextgov/FCW that the agency is “rolling out additional apprenticeship positions over the next few weeks.”
Workforce
A year after State layoffs, ex-feds say U.S. is paying the price in Iran and Ebola crises
Democratic lawmakers at a Thursday press conference also touted a new bill that would exempt foreign service officers who were pushed out by the Trump administration from being required to take the Foreign Service Officer Test if they wish to rejoin.
Workforce
More than 50 Dem lawmakers demand more Schedule F transparency
Efforts to understand the true scope of the recent executive order moving around 8,000 career federal jobs into Schedule Policy/Career, making their incumbents effectively at-will employees, have been stymied by the administration’s scant public documentation.
Workforce
Arbitrator restores telework and remote work at the Forest Service
The U.S. Forest Service violated its collective bargaining agreement with the National Federation of Federal Employees last year when it unilaterally canceled telework and remote work agreements en masse as part of the Trump administration’s return-to-office mandate.
Workforce
The biggest story in the federal workforce cuts isn't how many left, it's who wasn't replaced
COMMENTARY | The data suggest the workforce reduction reshaped not just the size of government, but the expertise available to carry out its work, one expert argues.
Workforce
Fired EPA dissenters sue for reinstatement, alleging First Amendment violations
Seven former EPA employees said they were targeted for removal for signing an open “declaration of dissent” in their personal capacities because they had fewer civil service protections rather than any wrongdoing.
Workforce
Judges block Trump effort to narrow public service loan forgiveness
The rulings preserve existing eligibility rules for now while testing how much authority the Education Department has to reshape a popular benefit for public service workers.
Workforce
Unions sue to restore DOD collective bargaining rights, asserting ‘chaos’
A new lawsuit alleges that Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth’s order last April to terminate most union contracts led to a slapdash implementation process that stripped bargaining rights even from those exempt from President Trump’s anti-labor executive orders.
Updated
Workforce
Some disabled veterans say losing telework accommodations is making it harder for them to keep working at the VA
Employees with disabilities at several agencies have alleged that they’re being forced to return to the office, even though the Trump administration’s directive ending telework flexibility for the civil service exempted those with qualifying reasonable accommodations.
Workforce
Trump wants to scrap a key framework for federal employee discipline
Officials said the Douglas factors, 12 criteria federal agencies have used for 45 years to devise and justify discipline for misconduct, are too restrictive and “mechanistic.” Practitioners disagree.
Workforce
OPM proposes ‘decentralized’ FEVS with fewer questions and less transparency
Agencies would be expected to conduct their own workforce surveys each year, with little rules on how much, or how little, they divulge to the public about it.
Workforce
OPM finalizes ‘Nixonian’ rule centralizing and enabling some federal firings
Under final regulations published this week, the federal government’s dedicated HR agency can remove federal employees from across government over suitability and conduct issues—blocking most avenues for appeal.
Workforce
Union accuses Treasury and HHS of neglecting telework requests from employees with disabilities
The lawsuit highlights federal employees who have been waiting for more than a year to hear back about their reasonable accommodation requests as well as individuals whose need to telework ended before the agency responded.
Workforce
IRS agrees to stop stealing workers’ pro-union decorations
The National Treasury Employees Union sued the agency earlier this month after multiple instances in which management confiscated and disposed of flyers and other decorations from employees’ workstations and communal bulletin boards.
Workforce