Politics
Trump’s Moves to Upend Federal Bureaucracy Touch Off Fear and Confusion
An Education Department employee was attending a funeral this week when she got the call: She was being placed on administrative leave because she works on projects that connect Black students, among others, to federal government programs.
A disabled veteran employed at the Department of Veterans Affairs grew emotional when he heard about the rescinding of telework options, unsure whether it would mean the end of his job taking care of fellow soldiers.
A Federal Trade Commission employee was so anxious that he told family members not to talk about politics on unencrypted lines. Across government agencies, workers eyed one another nervously, wondering whether a colleague would report them, accusing them of resisting the new administration’s move to end certain programs.
President Trump’s rapid push to overhaul the federal bureaucracy in his first days in office has been met with a mix of fear, fury and confusion throughout the work force.
Dozens of employees across the government, many of whom spoke on the condition of anonymity because of worries of retribution, described agencies gripped with uncertainty about how to implement the new policies and workers frantically trying to assess the impact on their careers and families. As the nation’s largest employer, the upheaval in the federal government could reverberate in communities throughout the country.
Starting on Inauguration Day, the orders and memos came down one after the other, many crafted in the pugnacious tone of a campaign speech: the shuttering of “Radical and Wasteful” diversity programs in federal agencies; the stripping of civil service protections from a share of the federal work force; the end to remote work, which, one administration memo claimed, had left federal office buildings “mostly empty” and rendered downtown Washington “a national embarrassment.”
All new hiring was frozen, job offers were rescinded, scientific meetings were canceled and federal health officials were temporarily barred from communicating with the public, a directive that some understood as so broad that it even extended to making outside purchase orders for lab supplies.
For the more than two million federal workers, roughly four-fifths of whom live outside the Washington area, change is inevitable whenever a new administration takes over. But few had expected it to come at this speed and scale.
“They are being upended in the most brutal and traumatic way imaginable,” said Max Stier, president of the Partnership for Public Service, a nonprofit that works to promote excellence and best practices in the federal government. Mr. Stier said he had deep concerns about the consequences of Mr. Trump’s swift changes on the ability of the country to face a range of threats, from terrorism to pandemics.
An ambition to change things is reasonable, he said. But “the speed is unnecessary and destructive,” he added.
Federal employees looked to their supervisors for guidance, but said they often had none to give, as they tried to interpret brief orders and memos with few specifics. For example, the return-to-office memo said employees with a disability could be exempt, but it was unclear what kind of disability might qualify. Some managers said they knew nothing beyond what was in the news. Adding to the panic were remarks by the president himself, who suggested on Friday that he might consider shuttering the Federal Emergency Management Agency, which employs 20,000 workers around the country.
A spokesperson from the Office of Personnel Management defended the actions in a statement, calling them “exciting steps to build a federal work force based on merit, excellence and accomplishment, so we can have a government that serves the public effectively and efficiently.”
“We have already saved millions of hard-earned taxpayer dollars that are no longer directed to DEIA programs that wasted millions of hard-earned taxpayer dollars and discriminated against federal workers,” the statement said, referring to diversity, equity, inclusion and accessibility efforts.
Donald F. Kettl, an emeritus professor at the University of Maryland who studies the civil service, said there was widespread consensus among experts that the civil service is in need of changes.
“It’s too hard to hire, it’s too tough to fire, and there’s too little match between the civil service system and the capacity government needs to handle 21st-century challenges,” Dr. Kettl said.
But he said that many of the Trump administration’s proposed changes would be counterproductive. “They’re focused much more on shifting the balance of power than they are on improving the results of government,” he said.
Inside federal offices, the mood has been tense and anticipatory. One employee at the Homeland Security Department said the staff felt at risk of being fired at any moment. At the Commerce Department, employees were terrified whenever a meeting was called, one worker said.
The isolation is deepened, some federal employees said, by the fact that most of their fellow Americans see the federal government as bloated and inefficient. Some said that reform, if it were well thought-out, would be healthy and welcome. But many noted that they had accepted significant pay cuts to work for the government because they believe in public service — issuing Social Security checks, keeping air travel safe and inspecting food, among other roles.
“The reality is that the American economy needs my agency’s work,” said Colin Smalley, a geologist with the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers and the president of his local of the International Federation of Professional and Technical Engineers. “We keep construction projects going, ports and waterways open, power grids functioning, and we protect communities from natural disasters and help affected communities recover. Hurting our mission hurts the public.”
Compounding the anxiety was a directive from the Office of Personnel Management instructing agency heads to turn over by Jan. 24 names of those who were still in their probationary period, typically within one or two years of their hiring.
The directive noted that such employees “can be terminated during that period without triggering appeal rights,” and that managers should determine whether they should be retained, according to a copy obtained by The New York Times.
Jacqueline Simon, the policy director for the American Federation of Government Employees, which has about 300,000 active members across dozens of agencies, said that attempts to terminate federal employees still in their probationary periods could have damaging effects on government services.
For example, she said, employees of the Food Safety and Inspection Service, who work in meat and poultry plants to prevent diseased animals and other contaminants from entering the food supply, frequently leave within a year because the job is so depleting.
“It’s not a job you stay in long,” Ms. Simon said, calling the work “dirty and dangerous.” If the Trump administration were to remove everyone in the service who was still on probation, she added, there would be a severe shortage of inspectors at meat processing plants.
An attorney at a federal enforcement agency said he works on a team of more than a dozen lawyers, more than half of whom are still in their probationary period. If the team were to lose all of its members still on probation, the attorney said, it would be “catastrophic” for the team’s ability to shoulder its law enforcement responsibilities.
One of the most sweeping changes made by Mr. Trump in his first week was to order federal workers back to the office full time by later next month, ending years of a flexible telecommuting policy, which in many offices dated to well before the pandemic. For some who want to keep working for the government, this could mean selling homes, changing children’s schools and moving hundreds of miles in a matter of weeks. New mothers are debating whether they will be able to return from maternity leave, and couples have been forced to choose who gets to keep their current jobs.
Many offices do not currently have enough room for all of the employees to come back. This, some contend, is the whole point. Shortly after the November election, Elon Musk and Vivek Ramaswamy, the men tapped by Mr. Trump to remake the government, wrote in a Wall Street Journal op-ed: “Requiring federal employees to come to the office five days a week would result in a wave of voluntary terminations that we welcome.”
“I think we know where it looks like he’s trying to go, which is to force people to quit,” said Representative Glenn F. Ivey of Maryland, a Democrat whose district is home to tens of thousands of federal workers. “They’re going to try and force a lot of federal employees out of work, and then replace them with political loyalists.”
The administration’s efforts are already being challenged in court by unions and other groups, who argue, among other things, that the lifting of civil service protections runs afoul of laws governing federal workers.
Among the first to feel the direct impact of the president’s new policies were employees working on diversity, equity and inclusion initiatives and programming. Mr. Trump ordered the immediate shutdown of all such offices, with their staff placed on administrative leave by Wednesday at 5 p.m. Agencies were ordered to draw up plans to lay them off by Jan. 31. The administration also threatened employees with “adverse consequences” if they failed to report on colleagues who defy the orders within 10 days, setting up a special email account for such reports.
The Education Department employee who was placed on leave while she was at a funeral said she had worked on an acclaimed program connecting students with scholarships and industry leaders, and helped Black people tap into government programs they often did not know existed. In various communications, the Trump administration has called such efforts “harmful” and “wasteful.”
“I guess if that’s harmful, then I’m proud of providing that harm — empowering the community to be better because we are brilliant,” she said. “We just don’t have the access to generational wealth and nepotism that they have, so we have to teach people how to make it for themselves.”
In a work force that is nearly 20 percent Black, many employees said there could be another consequence of the moves: making the federal government whiter and less diverse.
By the end of the week, some employees said wearily that they did not know how long they could hang on. Many described conditions as reminiscent of the McCarthy era, and were despondent to see how quickly their office’s leaders acquiesced.
At the Department of Labor, staff members watched a colleague who had been recently hired to a civil service position be escorted out because she was a former political appointee. One employee said her manager required her to scrub the website not only of the words “diversity, equity and inclusion,” as the executive order required, but also of references to “underserved” and “marginalized communities.” Afterward, she said, she went into a closet, called her mother and wept.
On Tuesday morning, Moriah Lee, an analyst at NASA, joined a virtual town hall to learn what all the orders would mean for her small team, which monitors and audits projects in the space program. The acting supervisors, people she had known personally for years, made it clear to everyone that they were not inclined to show flexibility, she said.
Gone was the weekly speaker series that had been organized under the diversity program, which had brought in deaf people, combat veterans and others to share their experiences. Gone was her ability to live in Nashville and go twice a month to an office two hours away in Huntsville, Ala.
After the meeting, she and her colleagues went back to their jobs. They were rattled, she said, but not afraid. “The people who are acting most in fear are the ones in authority,” she said.
But the change to remote work, combined with the other directives, was just too much for her. And so Ms. Lee sent in her notice: Nearly six years after she began working for the federal government, she was resigning.
Kate Kelly, Hamed Aleaziz and Sheryl Gay Stolberg contributed reporting from Washington.
Senator John Cornyn, Republican of Texas, may have the deciding vote on Todd Blanche’s confirmation as attorney general. Even a single Republican “no” vote would block Mr. Blanche’s nomination, and the senator said after Wednesday’s meeting that he had not made up his mind.
NEWYou can now listen to Fox News articles!
It was 2:35 am et Sunday.
The phone rang, yanking me out of deep slumber.
Calls like these are never good.
In the split second before I answered the phone, my mind traveled to the obvious place for any journalist who covers Capitol Hill and gets a call at that hour.
LINDSEY GRAHAM, SOUTH CAROLINA SENATOR WHO ROSE FROM SMALL-TOWN ROOTS TO GOP POWER BROKER, DIES AT 71
Former U.S. Sen. Lindsey Graham hugs his sister Darline Graham Nordone on June 1, 2015, in South Carolina. (Jessica McGowan/Getty Images)
Surely it was about former Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-KY).
McConnell has been out of service and nowhere to be found for weeks — after being hospitalized with an unspecified illness. The internet was rife with conspiracy theories and conjecture. And, considering the dearth of information, I suspected the worst.
My longtime colleague Jodie Curtis was on the line when I picked up. Jodie is a senior figure at Fox, forced into weekend overnight assignment editor duty because of an illness. Jodie calling to tell me that Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-SC) was dead.
“Graham?” I asked incredulously. “Not McConnell?”
Emerging from my stupor, I instinctively presumed this might be about the infirm, Kentucky Republican. You’d have better odds presuming that overnight call was about McConnell than hitting an exacta wheel at Churchill Downs.
My instincts immediately kicked in.
What if this was psy-ops by the Russians, Chinese or Iranians. A rouse. A hoax. A hack.
I told my colleague to just wait a moment while we confirmed. It would be easy to get this wrong.
Back in the 1990s, lawmakers “killed” comedian Bob Hope on the House floor, prematurely announcing his death during special orders speeches. Yours truly – and everyone else in Washington – prematurely reported the death of the late Rep. Stephanie Tubbs-Jones (D-OH). She suffered from a catastrophic brain aneurism. Yet after they removed the Congresswoman from life support, she continued to live for a few hours before dying.
However, it became clear that Lindsey Graham was indeed dead. I was quickly on the air. When asked about the shock of Graham passing, I invoked a Native American adage: Death comes. And it’s always out of season.
Lindsey Graham was gone. But who would succeed him on Capitol Hill?
Think all in the family. At least for now.
Sens. Katie Britt (R-AL) and Tim Scott (R-SC) both implored the late senator’s kid sister Darline Graham to follow her brother. President Trump believed it would be a fitting tribute to the senator. So did South Carolina Gov. Henry McMaster (R) – who was in charge the appointment.
“It’s my honor to ask his sister to finish his work now,” said McMaster.
Darline Graham is a political neophyte. Lindsey Graham adopted his sister after their parents died – and Darline was a teenager.
“Lindsey has always been there for me. And now I will be there for him,” said now Sen. Darline Graham (R-SC).
Lindsey Graham was his sister’s caretaker. Now she’s the caretaker of his Senate seat until January.
But who’s next?
South Carolina has a small Congressional delegation. Rep. Joe Wilson (R-SC) quickly excluded himself from the immediate running, noting the importance of remaining in the House. Plucking one of South Carolina’s House GOP members and appointing them to the Senate is a problem for the narrow Republican majority. The Constitution bars appointments to the House. So McMaster would have diminished the GOP’s slim majority had he picked a House member to fill in for Lindsey Graham. It would take months to conduct a special election to fill the vacant House seat.
Appointing Darline Graham solves that problem.
Reps. Russell Fry (R-SC), Nancy Mace (R-SC) and Ralph Norman (R-SC) are all interested in running for the full term. South Carolina will hold a snap primary in mid August. The winner will face Democrat Annie Andrews in November. Lindsey Graham had just secured the Republican nomination for a fifth term last month.
President Trump’s influence will play an outsized role in who gets the nod. He’s already singled out Fry.
But the election will look a little different this fall. November will mark the first time since the mid-1950s that either Lindsey Graham or late, legendary Sen. Strom Thurmond (R-SC) isn’t on the ballot in the Palmetto State.
The Senate met for the first time Monday afternoon since Graham’s passing.
“Lord, we remember with gratitude his commitment to the responsibilities entrusted to him and the many ways he sought to serve the people of this country. Give comfort, strength and peace to his family, friends, colleagues and all who mourn his passing,” prayed Senate Chaplain Barry Black.
The Senate shrouded Graham’s desk with a black cloak. A bouquet of white roses rested on the desk, signifying a new beginning without a Senate titan.
“The halls of the Senate already feel empty without him,” said Senate Majority Leader John Thune (R-SD).
‘THIS IS NOT NORMAL’: AOC UNLOADS ON MCCONNELL’S PROLONGED ABSENCE
Former Sen. Lindsey Graham attends a press conference on border security at the U.S. Capitol in Washington, D.C. on December 7, 2023. (Kevin Dietsch/Getty Images)
Well wishers left notecards and flowers outside Graham’s office in the Russell Senate Office Building.
Senators praised Graham’s tenacity.
“He didn’t want to just argue about things. He wanted to actually solve things,” said Sen. James Lankford (R-OK) on Fox.
Even until the end.
Over the weekend, Graham appeared to forge a deal on a Russia sanctions measure.
“This could be well, this could well be the end of the war in Ukraine. It could put all the pressure on Russia to finally end their illegal war of aggression,” predicted Sen. Angus King (I-ME).
Lindsey Graham first won a seat in Congress in 1994 as part of the “Republican Revolution.” That’s the historic class which flipped control of the House for the first time in 40 years. Graham and Senate Armed Services Committee Chairman Roger Wicker (R-MS) are the only members from that 1994 class still serving in Congress.
Graham earned a national profile barely four years after arriving in Washington. House GOP leaders tapped Graham to serve as one of the House “managers,” prosecuting articles of impeachment for President Clinton in the Senate.
“Impeachment is not about punishment,” argued Graham before the Senate in January, 1999. “Impeachment is about cleansing the office.”
Three years after that, Graham left the House. He became one of 100 in the Senate. But his colleagues conceded that the institution felt hollow at just 99.
“I am comforted by the knowledge that in the end, he has just changed his address. And that one day, Mr. President….” said Thune on the floor, pausing for ten seconds. “We will laugh together again.”
The Leader’s voice then cracked as he fought back tears.
“Mr. President, I yield the floor,” Thune whispered.
By Tuesday afternoon, Darline Graham became the 2,022nd senator in American history. But the first to immediately succeed her brother.
“He always said that his greatest accomplishment was the way that Darline turned out,” said Britt.
“I’m glad that there will be another Sen. Graham and that Darline will serve with us,” said
Sen. Chris Coons (D-DE). “That’ll allow for some continuity.”
Graham’s passing leaves a Congressional chasm.
“It will be difficult to pass anything without Sen. Graham because he’s been such a significant voice in the Senate,” said Sen. Cynthia Lummis (R-WY).
It’s unclear if any of that will fall to the Senate’s newest member.
LINDSEY GRAHAM’S SISTER CARRIES ON LATE SENATOR’S WORK, BECOMING SOUTH CAROLINA’S FIRST FEMALE SENATOR
Darline Graham Nordone speaks during a press conference outside the governor’s South Carolina State House office in Columbia. (Grant Baldwin/Getty Images)
CLICK HERE TO DOWNLOAD THE FOX NEWS APP
Darline Graham joined her brother’s side when he briefly ran for President in 2015. She says Lindsey taught her how to ride a bike while growing up.
“He would hold on to the bicycle as I pedaled. And he’d run along beside of me. Give me a big push and shout ‘Keep pedaling! Keep pedaling!’ said the new senator. ” And then he was the one who comforted me when I stopped pedaling and fell off the bicycle.”
Today, Darline Graham is again hopping onto that bicycle to finish Lindsey Graham’s term.
You can almost hear the late senator, in his “upstate” twang shouting to his sister “Keep pedaling! Keep pedaling!”
Democrat Xavier Becerra holds a commanding lead in the California governor’s race in a new poll, which also shows broad voter support for a ballot proposition to reform the state’s landmark environmental law to speed up housing and infrastructure.
The survey by the Public Policy Institute of California, released Wednesday night, focused primarily on questions related to climate change and environmental policies.
The results show Californians have a strong distaste for building data centers for artificial intelligence technology, and largely favor the state’s efforts to protect the environment and cut emissions — with some exceptions.
The survey showed Becerra with a big lead over Republican Steve Hilton in the race to replace term-limited Gov. Gavin Newsom. Becerra, a longtime Democratic officeholder, received support from 61% of likely voters, compared with 36% for Hilton, a populist conservative who once advised a British prime minister.
Gubernatorial candidate Steve Hilton speaks at the National Assn. of Latino Elected and Appointed Officials conference in L.A. on Wednesday.
(Myung J. Chun / Los Angeles Times)
The results are not surprising in a state where Democratic voters significantly outnumber Republicans. The GOP has not won a statewide election since 2008.
Just 2% of likely voters said they were unsure which candidate to support in the November election. The poll results skewed heavily partisan, with more than 9 in 10 Democratic and Republican voters picking their party’s respective candidate. Most independent voters leaned toward Becerra, 60%, over Hilton, 34%.
The results are similar to data from a poll conducted just before the June 2 primary election that asked voters to pick between the two candidates. In that survey, 52% said they supported Becerra and 31% were for Hilton.
In a statement Wednesday, Hilton characterized the race as “wide open,” contending that Becerra’s support was weaker than the poll’s headline figures would indicate.
“Instead of a 36-year career politician, we need a positive, energetic problem-solver with business experience and plans to make our state ‘Califordable’ — that’s me,” Hilton said.
Becerra spokesman Jonathan Underland said in a statement that “Californians got to know Xavier Becerra during the primary, and they’re ready to make him their next governor. We’re keeping our eyes on the prize — hitting the trail every day ’til November to turn that support into votes.”
Support for CEQA reform
A ballot measure aimed at reforming the California Environmental Quality Act to speed up construction notched a strong showing in the poll.
Nearly three-quarters of likely voters, including majorities of Democrats, Republicans and independents, said that they would vote for Proposition 45. The measure would shorten windows for environmental review, public comment and legal challenges for certain housing, transportation, water infrastructure and other projects.
“At this early stage in the campaign, California voters are feeling more aligned with Democratic candidates on the environment, and it shows in the polling,” said PPIC survey director Mark Baldassare. “But strong support for Proposition 45 reveals their desire to balance environmental priorities with housing and infrastructure needs.”
Strong data center opposition
The poll found large majorities of Californians do not want new data centers to support the AI boom built in their area; 44% of adults say they “strongly oppose” such projects, and 29% “somewhat oppose” them.
The majority opposition holds across political parties, geographic regions, gender, race and income. It’s especially pronounced in the Inland Empire, where plans for a 950,000-square-foot data center came to a halt after fierce resident pushback. Three-quarters of people surveyed in that region said they oppose building new data centers.
“Every day, we are hearing about how local communities across the nation are responding to plans for data centers,” Baldassare said. “Californians have weighed in and they share this growing concern.”
Support for environmental policies — except if they cost more
The poll also shows strong, if somewhat qualified, support for California’s efforts to reduce climate-warming greenhouse gas emissions and protect the environment.
Three-quarters of adults said policies to reduce greenhouse gas emissions have been a good thing overall, and 65% said they support California leaders’ efforts to make their own environmental policies separate from the federal government.
While most respondents — 62% — said they favor a law requiring 100% of the state’s electricity to come from renewable energy sources within the next two decades, just 38% said they were willing to pay more for electricity sourced from renewables.
“With energy prices spiking and affordability a growing concern, Californians are just not willing to pay more for renewable energy,” Baldassare said. A near-unanimous majority, 96%, said the cost of energy — including gasoline, natural gas and electricity — is a problem.
Newsom’s move to ban the sale of new gas-powered vehicles in the state by 2035 also appears to have fallen out of favor. Two-thirds of Californians oppose the policy, a significant slip in approval from 2021, when a PPIC survey showed 49% supported the move.
Still, majorities of likely voters — 53% and 51%, respectively — said they approve of Newsom’s and the state Legislature’s handling of environmental issues.
At 28%, President Trump’s approval rating on the environment was much lower. In his second term, Trump has moved to slash environmental regulations, including easing pollution regulations on coal-fired power plants and pushing for oil drilling off California’s coast.
“Given this ratings gap, it’s not surprising that Californians want to see the state take the lead on climate change policy,” Baldassare said.
The survey polled 1,578 California adults, 1,003 of whom were likely voters, in English and Spanish from June 29 to July 6 and had a margin of error of 3.8 percentage points in either direction.
-
Los Angeles, Ca1 hour agoWater main break floods West Hollywood streets, traps cars
-
Detroit, MI2 hours agoDetroit’s air quality early Thursday ranked as hazardous, worst in the world
-
San Francisco, CA2 hours ago‘It was a scene from the Titanic’: Fishermen recall rescuing passengers from sinking boat in SF Bay
-
Dallas, TX2 hours agoBig picture takeaways from the Dallas Mavericks first week at Summer League
-
Miami, FL2 hours ago“We’re going to be champions”. Argentina fans in Miami Beach celebrate team’s win against England
-
Boston, MA2 hours ago4 Red Sox Trade Targets to Solidify Boston’s Push for a Playoff Spot
-
Denver, CO2 hours agoRTD considers ending Denver’s 16th Street FreeRide shuttle due to budget issues
-
Seattle, WA2 hours agoTrump immediately fires the new court-appointed top prosecutor in Seattle | CNN Politics
