In a striking decision, a federal judge, appointed by Obama, has mandated that the Trump Administration must rehire around 20,000 probationary employees who were recently dismissed across 18 federal agencies. This ruling comes from US District Judge James Bredar, who emphasized that such significant layoffs cannot be executed without prior notice to the workers.
Judge Bredar noted, “When the federal government terminates large numbers of its employees, including those still on probation because they were recently hired or promoted, it must follow certain rules,” as he laid out in a 56-page order. “Some of those rules are intended to help states manage the consequences of sudden, mass layoffs.” The full document can be viewed here.
The judge further explained that the Trump Administration claimed the firings were due to “performance” or individualized reasons, but this was found to be baseless: “On the record before the Court, this isn’t true. There were no individualized assessments of employees. They were all just fired. Collectively.”
This legal action was initiated by 20 Democratic State Attorneys General, including New Jersey’s Attorney General, who expressed their satisfaction on social media:
NEW: A judge has blocked Trump’s illegal mass firings of probationary federal employees in our case.
Time and time again, we are making clear that the President is not above the law.
We will not let him violate the law and harm our state’s residents
— Attorney General Matt Platkin (@NewJerseyOAG)
March 14, 2025
According to a report from ABC News, this ruling halts the Trump administration’s “illegal” workforce reductions and reinstates the probationary government employees terminated from 18 agencies. Judge Bredar’s order prevents further mass layoffs without proper notice.
This ruling affects numerous federal agencies, but notably not the Defense Department, the National Archives, or the Office of Personnel Management (OPM). This decision comes as a separate legal victory against similar actions by the Trump administration, following a ruling by a federal judge in California.
In San Francisco, US District Judge William Alsup, a Clinton appointee, also ruled that the OPM’s termination of probationary employees was illegal, mandating their rehiring at six federal agencies, including the Veterans Affairs, Defense, Energy, Interior, Treasury, and Agriculture departments.
President Trump has been actively pursuing a reduction in federal workforce size to eliminate inefficiencies and cut waste, resulting in the termination of thousands of probationary employees.
