Politics
Judges Have Ordered Federal Workers Back on the Job. Now What?
Last month, thousands of employees with probationary status across the federal government were fired by the Trump administration in an extraordinary and coordinated move. On Thursday, a pair of court rulings called for agencies to reinstate a untold number of them.
What happens now isn’t so clear cut.
Agencies are sorting out how to bring back these employees and give them the back pay ordered by the courts. Some of the fired workers may indeed return to their jobs. Others may be placed on administrative leave until their agencies undergo a round of large-scale layoffs, the planning for which is already underway.
The mass firings of probationary workers were just one early phase of President Trump’s aggressive plan to shrink the federal government. His administration appeared to target probationary employees because they do not have the same civil service protections as employees who have been in their job longer. But a flurry of challenges to the legality of how Trump officials went about ordering up the personnel changes have resulted in some reprieves, at least temporarily or on paper.
In interviews and on social media, fired employees expressed excitement about being reinstated and getting paid for the days since they were fired. Still, many employees are in the dark, learning details about their livelihood through media reports.
Here is what we know about the reinstatements, and what we don’t.
What did the judges order?
The rulings, in federal courts in California and Maryland, call for a pause in the firings and reinstatement of probationary employees across 19 agencies. The cases themselves will continue to move forward, with the government planning to appeal.
But the plaintiffs’ goals were to at least temporarily stop the administration from firing more probationary workers and obtain relief, such as back pay, for the employees already out of work.
The judges ruled that the firings were carried out unlawfully in accordance with orders from the Office of Personnel Management, the government’s human resources office. Only the agencies themselves have the authority to direct those personnel changes, one of the judges wrote.
Judge James Bredar of the U.S. District Court for the District of Maryland restricted the government from firing any more probationary workers for two weeks. Judge Bredar said the employees covered in the lawsuit, who are from 18 different agencies, must be reinstated by March 17.
Judge William H. Alsup of the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of California, ordered the government to pause firings and reinstate probationary employees at six agencies while the case continues. His order applied to the Pentagon, the Treasury, and the departments of Agriculture, Energy, Veterans Affairs, and the Interior.
Lawyers representing those groups estimated at least 10,000 people were affected across those agencies, numbers more or less consistent with data collected by The Times.
The judge’s orders follow a similar decision handed down by the Merit Systems Protection Board, an independent administrative body that reviews government personnel decisions. It ordered on March 5 that certain probationary employees, mostly from the Department of Agriculture, be reinstated for at least 45 days.
What have the fired employees heard?
It depends on who you ask. There does not appear to be a uniform way that agencies are going about reinstating fired probationary employees.
Tim Kauffman, a spokesman for the American Federation of Government Workers, which is involved in one of the cases, said the union does not know how many of its members will be offered their jobs back. Mr. Kauffman said agencies had denied union requests for the number of fired probationary employees.
The union representing workers for the Internal Revenue Service sent an email to probationary employees who were fired, informing them that they were in the process of speaking with agency management about the next steps. In the email, shared with The New York Times, the National Treasury Employees Union said employees with one agency — the Energy Department — have started receiving reinstatement notifications after the court orders on Thursday.
“We are pressing other agencies to issue reinstatement notices as quickly as possible,” the email stated. The Energy Department did not respond to a request for comment.
Some employees from the National Institutes of Health were notified of their reinstatement through an email Thursday from the agency’s human resources division.
“Upon further review, the agency has determined to rescind the letter sent to you on 2/15/2025,” the email stated, adding that the National Institutes of Health will work with them on a return to their jobs. The agency did not respond to a request for comment.
Some fired probationary employees from the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau have heard from the agency’s human resources division that reinstatements are underway, according to Cat Farman, the president of the local chapter of the employee union. The agency did not respond to a request for comment.
Other fired employees, however, are still getting “off-boarding” messages from the agency, Ms. Farman said, such as reminders to turn in their government-issued equipment.
Does this mean employees will immediately be back at work?
Not necessarily.
The Department of Agriculture, for example, said in a statement this week that it had returned all its fired probationary workers to “pay status” as of Wednesday. The statement did not say how many, or if any, workers would be returning to their jobs.
“The department will work quickly to develop a phased plan for return to duty, and while those plans materialize, all probationary employees will be paid,” the statement said.
But it was not clear that similar information was communicated to all of the fired employees at the agency. The agency did not respond to a request for comment.
“I’m getting really frustrated,” said Jacob Bushno, one of the probationary employees fired. He said he has not received any communications from the agency, and that he had reached out to his human resources department and his managers.
“Zero. No guidance,” he said on Friday. Mr. Bushno, a veteran who did two tours in Iraq while he was in the Army’s air assault division, was fired just seven days before he completed his one-year probationary period at the Forest Service.
“When will we get paid/back pay? Do we get to come back to the office?” he asked.
A probationary employee who was fired from Housing and Urban Development last month similarly has not heard from the agency. The employee spoke on condition of anonymity out of fear of retribution. The housing agency did not respond to a request for comment. Ashaki Robinson, a representative for the union that represents workers at the agency, said the union has not heard of any fired employees hearing from the agency as of late Friday afternoon.
Can the Trump administration still move forward with other layoffs?
Yes.
The judge’s rulings do not protect anyone from mass firings through other methods in the future. As the rulings came down on Thursday, federal agencies were finalizing plans to cut an even larger swath of the federal work force.
In the Maryland case, the judge told the government that it couldn’t carry out future mass firings without prior notice as required by law.
In the case in California, the judge made plain that agencies planning to conduct large-scale layoffs, known as a “reduction in force,” can still proceed in accordance with the laws that govern such processes — meaning that the reprieves for workers may only be temporary.
Apoorva Mandavilli contributed reporting.
Politics
FBI arrests protester who threatened to kill ICE officer’s family at NJ detention center protest, Blanche says
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Acting US Attorney General Todd Blanche on Friday said that a man who made death threats against a U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement officer and his family at a protest in New Jersey Thursday night had been arrested.
The arrest came just hours after Blanche promised the protester, who was captured on video, would be found and arrested.
“That’s a federal crime,” Blanche said on Fox News’ “The Will Cain Show” on Thursday. “Not only threatening the ICE officer — but think about how disgusting this individual is by threatening his wife and his children with death.
In the video, the protester can be heard taunting the officer: “I will kill your whole f—ing family. Your whole f—ing family is dead. Your children and wife all dead. I have your face mother—er! All dead!”
ANTI-ICE AGITATOR SCREAMS ‘I’LL KILL YOUR WHOLE F- FAMILY’ DAY AFTER DEM GOV PRAISES ‘PEACEFUL PROTESTING’
Federal immigration officers clashed with protesters outside Delaney Hall in Newark, N.J., on Thursday. (Mostafa Bassim/Anadolu)
Blanche said the officer was just doing his job and “standing there.”
On Friday evening, Blanche wrote on X: Told you. @FBI just arrested the man who threatened to kill ICE officers and their families. FAFO.”
He has not yet been identified.
ANTI-ICE PROTESTERS CLASH WITH AGENTS OUTSIDE NEW JERSEY DETENTION CENTER AS GOV. SHERRILL DENIED ENTRY
The clash occurred Thursday evening outside of Newark’s Delaney Hall detention center where protesters were accused of biting, kicking and punching agents.
The protests were in their sixth night by Thursday. (Mostafa Bassim/Anadolu)
Agents responded by deploying pepper spray and beating back agitators as the protest continued into its sixth night.
Nine rioters were arrested during the clashes Thursday, the Department of Homeland Security told Fox News Digital.
ANTI-ICE AGITATORS THROW WOODEN PALLETS, MATTRESSES AT FEDERAL AGENTS DURING CHAOTIC NJ DETENTION CENTER CLASH
Approximately 100 protesters mobbed the area surrounding the detention center, chanting “F— ICE” and brandishing black umbrellas, gas masks and other gear to protect themselves from pepper spray and various anti-riot measures.
On Wednesday evening, DHS reported that approximately 100 anti-ICE protesters gathered around the Delaney Hall ICE facility. While rioters assaulted and threw objects at law enforcement, DHS said “local police refused to help our officers.” Six rioters were arrested Wednesday night for allegedly assaulting law enforcement officers.
ICE agents use chemical irritants during clashes with protestors outside the federal immigration center at Delaney Hall in Newark, N.J., on Thursday. (Adam Gray/Getty Images)
“We called local police, we called state police multiple times. Listen, I know the law enforcement there would love to respond, but because of Governor Sherrill’s behavior what the governor is doing, she’s not allowing public officers and state officers to respond,” Mullin said during a Thursday morning appearance on Fox & Friends.
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Demonstrations over conditions for detainees began Friday, May 22, after detainees penned an open letter claiming they were being denied access to medical care, being insufficiently fed and detained without due process.
DHS has denied those claims.
Fox News’ Charles Creitz and Robert McGreevy contributed to this report.
With California facing increasingly destructive wildfires, experts and officials have long urged the strategic removal of dense, flammable vegetation that can erupt into particularly destructive flames from a lightning bolt or the spark of a power line.
But after years of record investment by the state in such wildfire risk mitigation, two key money sources are drying up, potentially reducing the state’s annual budget for vegetation removal by hundreds of millions of dollars.
Wildfire resiliency advocates are warning that the loss of these funds will leave the state vulnerable to devastation, and are calling on California’s next governor to take that threat seriously.
Currently, California relies heavily on two funding sources for wildfire mitigation work: A state program that charges polluters for their emissions and a climate bond approved by voters in 2024.
Late Friday, however, state officials adopted a new structure for the emissions program, called cap-and-invest, that analysts say will likely reduce wildfire mitigation funding by $200 million per year. At the same time, the governor’s latest budget proposal puts the state on track to allocate the majority of the climate bond’s $1.5 billion in wildfire prevention money within just three years.
As a result, California could go from routinely pulling more than $600 million a year from these sources, to just $150 million, according to an estimate from the Wildfire Solutions Coalition — a group of more than 80 organizations representing conservationists, business owners, fire officials and tribal leaders.
The coalition is urging the state to find new sources of funding for the work.
“We have the scientists, we have the technicians, we have the advocates,” said Michelle Decker, who is on the coalition’s executive committee and serves as president and CEO of the Inland Empire Community Foundation. “We see this problem. We can get ahead of this problem. It is a revenue issue.”
California wildfires have become increasingly costly. The 2025 L.A. fires alone caused an estimated $250 billion in damage and economic loss. Insurance companies have already paid out $22.4 billion.
In attempt to reduce the risk of damage to communities and ecosystems, the state has employed a wide range of tactics. These includes fortifying homes against wildfires, replanting fire-ravaged forests and thinning out vegetation with prescribed burns, goat grazing and manual thinning with heavy machinery to reduce the intensity of potential fires.
Research suggests wildfire mitigation work pays off. A recent analysis of 285 fires in the western U.S. found that every dollar spent on landscape projects saved about $3.75 in wildfire damage.
But as funding from cap-and-invest and the climate bond dwindle, the state must increasingly turn to Cal Fire, which devotes only a small portion of its budget to mitigation work.
“This is not an issue that can be pushed off to a timeline based solely on politics,” said Steve Frisch, a founding member of the coalition and president of the Sierra Business Council. “Fire happens whether we want it to or not.”
After a series of destructive wildfires in Northern California and the 2017 Thomas fire in Southern California, the state legislature began to explicitly focus on funding wildfire mitigation.
In 2018, lawmakers directed $200 million per year of cap-and-invest funds to wildfire mitigation projects.
As the Woolsey fire in Southern California and the Camp fire in Paradise raged later that fall, Trump accused the state of “gross mismanagement” of forest lands and threatened to cut off federal funds unless it was corrected.
Gov. Gavin Newsom and the legislature, with a significant budget surplus, began earmarking even more funds, leading to a peak of $1.1 billion in wildfire mitigation investments during the 2021-2022 fiscal year.
After the surplus dwindled, the legislature opted in 2024 to put a $10-billion climate bond in front of voters — $1.5 billion of which was dedicated specifically for wildfire mitigation work.
Newsom has since pointed to this high state funding to call on the federal government to step up its own investments into forest management work.
The federal government manages 57% of all forests in the state. While the U.S. Forest Service spent $3.1 billion mitigating wildfire conditions in the state over the last few years, California spent $4.3 billion, according to the California Forest Resilience and Wildfire Task Force.
However, the state has already allocated about $600 million of the climate bond’s wildfire mitigation pot for the 2024-2025 and current fiscal years. The latest budget proposal would allocate more than $300 million for this upcoming fiscal year. While many advocates support allocating the money quickly, it leaves little for future years.
Once that money is spent, California has to pay off the $10 billion bond with interest. The result is an estimated price tag of $16 billion, paid in roughly $400 million increments every year, for 40 years, according to the state’s Legislative Analyst’s Office.
As for the cap-and-invest funds, a fraught months-long debate at the California Air Resources Board on how to extend the program beyond 2030 resulted in a compromise that will cut the revenue it generates in half, the Legislative Analyst’s Office estimates.
Since other projects get priority — including $1 billion every year for California’s high-speed rail project — the new proposal would “likely leave no funding” for the wildfire and forest resilience line item, the Legislative Analyst’s Office found.
Cal Fire still holds a modest annual budget for wildfire mitigation work. In the 2024-2025 fiscal year, the agency had $500 million for forest management and fire prevention that was not directly tied to cap-and-invest or the bond — up from about $65 million two decades prior.
As for the federal government, independent analyses by Grassroots Wildland Firefighters and NPR found that Forest Service wildfire mitigation work is on the decline amid federal staffing cuts. The Forest Service claims the decrease in work was primarily due to poor weather conditions for activities like prescribed burns and staff being occupied with firefighting.
Both the state and federal government’s investments pale in comparison to the spending of California’s investor-owned utilities. In 2025 alone, the utilities planned to spend more than $9.2 billion on preventing their equipment from sparking the next devastating wildfire, primarily funded by Californians’ electricity bills.
Times staff writer Hayley Smith contributed to this report.
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