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It’s Tuesday, the traditional day for elections and for our pause-and-consider newsletter on politics and policy. We think of it as a mini-magazine in your inbox.

AN UPDATE ON FEDERAL WORKERS
By Lisa Desjardins, @LisaDNews ([link removed])
Correspondent

Hello from Nebraska, where the cranes have converged ([link removed]) , a blizzard is on the way ([link removed]) and producer Kyle Midura and I are on the road, covering what people here think about the actions President Donald Trump has taken — and the effects seen so far.

We’ll have more about this trip in next week’s edition. (Meanwhile here is the playlist ([link removed]) accompanying us on Interstate 80 as I write on the laptop.)

For this week, let’s talk about where things stand for federal workers and the shape of the U.S. government.

Probationary workers restored (for now)

Some 25,000 fired probationary workers were reinstated, following two federal judges’ ([link removed]) rulings last week. Both decisions are temporary.

The wider of the two rulings, from District Judge James Bednar, affects 18 federal agencies. ([link removed]) Bednar ordered them to reinstate workers by Monday, for two weeks.

Many of those workers, including some I’m talking with, were immediately placed on administrative leave. Judge William Alsup, whose ruling affects six federal agencies ([link removed]) , said that is in violation of his order and has asked for a response from the federal government.

In other words: Thousands of workers are reinstated for at least two weeks, being paid but not allowed to work while on administrative leave.

As agencies move to make larger reductions in force, ([link removed]) many of these workers are bracing themselves to be terminated a different way, down to line.

Reductions in force

First, a reminder: These refer to significant staff reductions in federal staffing and there is a statutory process ([link removed]) for how these must be carried out. That includes 60-day notice to workers. There are also collective bargaining agreements that apply, which the Office of Personnel Management has told agencies to ignore. ([link removed]) (There is a 119-page document ([link removed]) outlining this process.)

This process is just starting. Agencies had a deadline last week to submit their reductions-in-force proposals to the White House. Here are some beginning figures:
* Department of Education: Some 1,300 workers ([link removed]) have been RIF’d as part of shrinking agency staff by nearly 50 percent ([link removed])
* Veterans Affairs: Secretary Doug Collins told PBS News Hour in early March that the agency plans to reduce its staff some 15 percent ([link removed]) . That is equal to more than 60,000 workers.
* Internal Revenue Service: The federal tax collector aims to cut as many as 6,800 workers ([link removed]) through a RIF. That is in addition to the thousands of probationary cuts now on hold.

The Associated Press put together a look at RIFs underway. ([link removed])

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Photo by Annabelle Gordon/Reuters

The big picture
* An estimated 25,000 probationary workers are in a legal limbo. The Federal News Network has a great look at the numbers by agency ([link removed])
* In total, an estimated 62,000 federal jobs were cut last month, per the jobs firm Challenger, Gray & Christmas ([link removed])
* A few agencies have been essentially shuttered, including USAID and the U.S. Agency for Global Media, which oversees U.S.-funded broadcasters such as Voice of America ([link removed]) , Radio Free Europe and Radio Free Asia.

Much of these effects are still coming to light. And court challenges continue, including as recently as today ([link removed]) . We’ll have more in the coming weeks.
More on politics from our coverage:
* Watch: White House ignores court and invokes Alien Enemies Act to deport hundreds of Venezuelans. ([link removed])
* One Big Question: Democrats don’t have a majority in either chamber of Congress. What tools does the party have to fight back? NPR’s Tamara Keith and Amy Walter of the Cook Political Report with Amy Walter discuss. ([link removed])
* A Closer Look: What is Voice of America? Why Trump is dismantling the broadcaster. ([link removed])
* Perspectives: “Murder the Truth” examines the growing effort to silence journalists and curtail free speech. ([link removed])

AT NOAA, FEARS THAT CUTS WILL MAKE AMERICANS LESS SAFE
[link removed]
Watch the segment in the player above.
By Joshua Barajas
Senior Editor, Digital

Tom Di Liberto is stuck in an “in-between space.”

He was fired from the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration in February, about two weeks before the end of his two-year probationary period. He’s one of the thousands of federal workers who received word early this week that he’d be reinstated, as a result of a judge’s order.

Hundreds of probationary NOAA workers like Di Liberto were terminated last month. It’s unclear how many employees at the nation's leading weather and climate science agency have been reinstated. But experts within and outside the agency have warned that the downsizing, led by the Department of Government Efficiency, would put public safety at risk. ([link removed])

The letter Di Liberto and other NOAA workers received from the Commerce Department said they would be placed in a “paid, non-duty status.” ([link removed])

This meant the climate scientist and public affairs specialist would be brought back, but on paid administrative leave until ongoing litigation is settled. He would also receive back pay dated to his date of termination.

What his employment at NOAA is going to look like in the near-future remains murky.

“There's a broad level of fear across the agency about whether folks will have their jobs next week or what this potentially may mean for projects that have been going on for years and years and years about trying to protect the people in this country.”

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Signs supporting the National Weather Service are seen outside its facility in Norman, Oklahoma. Photo by Adam Kemp/PBS News

NOAA is bracing for another round of possible cuts — a reported 1,029 jobs ([link removed]) , which would amount to 10 percent of its workforce.

The job cuts have hampered operations at the National Weather Service, said Brandon Dunstan, executive vice president of the National Weather Service Employees Organization. The union represents 4,000 employees at NWS, which is under NOAA.

NWS has had to reduce the amount of data collection it does, including stopping weather balloon ([link removed]) launches ([link removed]) that gather information in the atmosphere in different locations across the country, he said.

As these reductions move forward, they “will continue to put a burden and stress on the individuals that remain, and make it more difficult to carry out our mission in the National Weather Service,” Dunstan said.
More on federal workers from our coverage:
* The Future of Forecasting: As NOAA braces for more cuts, scientists say public safety is at risk. ([link removed])
* Gutting Veterans’ Health Care: 5 reasons federal cuts are hitting veterans especially hard ([link removed]) , courtesy of The Conversation.
* Layoffs hit FAA: How DOGE’s cutbacks at the Federal Aviation Administration could affect air safety. ([link removed])

THIS WEEK’S TRIVIA QUESTION

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In this 1894 political cartoon, an elderly woman with a broom labeled “Spoils System” kicks out a young woman whose hat reads “Civil Service Reform” from the “Democratic Home.” Civil service reform was a key issue throughout the Gilded Age. Illustration by Louis Dalrymple, courtesy of Library of Congress ([link removed])

By Joshua Barajas
Senior Editor, Digital

How big the U.S. federal government ought to be is a centuries-old question.

President Andrew Jackson inaugurated the “spoils system,” which was once the official hiring policy for the U.S. government. ([link removed]) Or simply: “To the victor belong the spoils.”

Once Old Hickory took office in 1829, he gave many federal jobs to loyalists. Qualifications or expertise weren’t major job requirements as much as loyalty to the election-winning political party. The “spoils system” wouldn’t get reformed until decades later when the Pendleton Act, passed in 1883, established a merit-based system ([link removed]) for federal employment.

Our question: Which U.S. president supported civil service reform and signed the Pendleton Act into law?

Send your answers to [email protected] (mailto:[email protected]) or tweet using #PoliticsTrivia. The first correct answers will earn a shout-out next week.

Last week, we asked: When was the last time U.S. spending was funded by a continuing resolution for an entire fiscal year?

The answer: 2013. ([link removed]) According to the Bipartisan Policy Center, a “year-long” CR has happened three times in the 21 century. Besides 2013, it happened in fiscal years 2011 and 2007.

Congratulations to our winners: John Cleveland and Brenda Radford!

Thank you all for reading and watching. We’ll drop into your inbox next week.
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