Judge Slams Trump For Putting Fired Probationary Workers On Paid Leave

A federal judge slammed the Trump administration Monday for putting fired workers entitled to reinstatement on paid administrative leave, saying they should be back on their jobs immediately.

Judge William Alsup, of the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of California, said in his order that putting workers on paid leave does nothing to fix the government services that were hurt due to the firings. He gave the Trump administration until 3 p.m. Eastern on Tuesday to explain what was going on.

“The Court has read news reports that, in at least one agency, probationary employees are being rehired but then placed on administrative leave en masse,” Alsup wrote in his order. “This is not allowed by the preliminary injunction, for it would not restore the services the preliminary injunction intends to restore.”

The Trump administration fired tens of thousands of probationary workers across the federal government last month as part of its sweeping cuts to government services led by the so-called Department of Government Efficiency.

Probationary employees typically have only a year or two on the job and have not worked long enough to secure tenure protections, though other employees are classified as probationary simply due to recent promotions.

The fired workers received termination notices saying they were losing their jobs for performance reasons — even though many had sterling work records and had never been disciplined before.

The American Federation of Government Employees and other unions have sued to have the workers reinstated, arguing that the firings were unlawful because they circumvented congressional power and violated the legal process for federal layoffs. Workers at several agencies subject to the litigation have been ordered temporarily reinstated while the case moves forward.

But the Trump administration appears to have put many of those workers on paid administrative leave, rather than back to work, according to multiple reports. For instance, HuffPost spoke to a fired probationary employee at the U.S. Agriculture Department who was told they would be put on leave and receive backpay dating to their firing, though they wouldn’t return to work.

Nearly 25,000 probationary workers are entitled to reinstatement under recent court orders finding the terminations were illegal, according to a tally by Federal News Network.

Alsup recently ruled that the firings of probationary employees were illegal because they were spearheaded by the Office of Personnel Management, which doesn’t have the authority to discipline workers at other federal agencies. A temporary restraining order required the administration to put workers in that case back on the job.

The White House claimed in a filing Monday that having to reinstate workers while the cases move forward would create “significant confusion” and cause “turmoil for the terminated employees.”

“Specifically, all employees offered reinstatement into full duty status would have to be onboarded again, including going through any applicable training, filling out human resources paperwork, obtaining new security badges, re-enrolling in benefits programs and payroll,” and more, the administration lamented.

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