The Purge Continues
The new administration is gutting the senior ranks of the civil service.
WaPo (“A career official tried to undo Trump’s purge at USAID. He was then purged, too.“):
The Trump administration’s purge of dozens of senior officials at the U.S. Agency for International Development encountered resistance on Thursday when the career employee who carried out the original directive rescinded it, calling the purge an “illegal” violation of “due process.”
The official was then promptly placed on administrative leave — according to emails obtained by The Washington Post — in the latest convulsion stemming from President Donald Trump’s 90-day freeze on foreign aid, which has ground to a halt humanitarian aid programs around the world and prompted U.S. contractors to furlough hundreds of employees and prepare to let go many thousands more.
“DOGE instructed me to violate the due process of our employees by issuing immediate termination notices to a group of employees without due process,” wrote Nicholas Gottlieb, the director of employee and labor relations at USAID, referring to the budget-slashing commission known as the “Department of Government Efficiency.” “I was notified moments ago that I will be placed on administrative leave, effective immediately. It has been an honor working with you all.”
[…]
More than 50 senior career USAID officials were put on administrative leave Monday, including deputy administrators and deputy assistant administrators.
The ousters, which came without warning, were followed by an explanation that the officials were trying to undermine the aid freeze, according to an agency-wide memo signed by Jason Gray, the newly installed acting administrator of USAID.
“We have identified several actions within USAID that appear to be designed to circumvent the President’s Executive orders and the mandate from the American people,” said Gray,who is also the chief information officer. “As a result, we have placed a number of USAID employees on administrative leave with full pay and benefits until further notice.”
On Thursday, Gottlieb sent an email to officials put on administrative leave saying that he had“reviewed the materials that served as the purported basis for your placement in this status” and “found no evidence that you engaged in misconduct.”
He informed colleagues at 2:04 p.m. that he decided to cancel their administrative leave status under his “authority.” Two hours later, Gottlieb sent a second email informing colleagues that he had been placed on administrative leave and bidding them farewell.
[…]
Trump officials have also warned aid groups and U.S. officials against speaking publicly about the aid freeze, which some officials have called a “gag order.”
In an email to the 10,000 USAID employees sent last Saturday, the leadership warned that “all communications outside the Agency, including the State Department, must be approved by the Agency Front Office.”
“Failure to abide by this directive, or any of the directives sent out earlier this week and in the coming weeks, will result in disciplinary action,” wrote Ken Jackson, the assistant to the administrator for management and resources.
WaPo (“Several senior FBI leaders told to leave agency or be fired, people familiar with matter say“):
Multiple senior FBI officials have been ordered to leave the bureau within days or be fired, according to three people familiar with the matter, a sign that President Donald Trump’s administration is purging leadership at an agency that has been a frequent target of his ire.
The ultimatums came as Trump’s nominee to lead the bureau, Kash Patel, vowed during his confirmation hearing Thursday that he would not take action against perceived enemies should he be confirmed as FBI director.
“All FBI employees will be protected against political retribution,” Patel told lawmakers.
While the Senate considers Patel’s nomination, the massive law enforcement bureau is being run by an acting director and an acting deputy director, both veteran agents appointed by the White House.
It is highly unusual for senior staffing changes to be made under such circumstances at the FBI, a law enforcement agency that is supposed to be insulated from politics.
The leaders who received the message about resigning or retiring by Monday included several executive assistant directors — managers who oversee criminal and national security investigations — as well as the top agents in some of the bureau’s field offices around the country, two people familiar with the situation said. They and the other person spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss sensitive personnel matters that have not been made public.
Some of the employees had been promoted under Christopher A. Wray, who resigned as FBI director this month in the face of repeated pledges from Trump that he would be fired. Some have not yet reached retirement age, meaning they could lose out on benefits to which they’d be entitled if they were not forced out.
[…]
The bureau’s leadership shake-up followed days of similar upheaval that has roiled the Justice Department. Interim leaders Trump installed there have moved swiftly to oust or reassign veteran career lawyers who they believe are insufficiently loyal to the president. They also fired prosecutors who worked on the Justice Department’s two special counsel investigations of Trump.
Both Trump and Patel have derided the Justice Department and the FBI for years, saying they believe it has been “weaponized” against conservatives and has put political concerns ahead of the pursuit of justice.
At his confirmation hearing, Patel pledged that, if confirmed, he would restore public trust in the bureau. He promised “a de-weaponized, de-politicized system of law enforcement completely devoted to rigorous obedience to the Constitution and a singular standard of justice.”
This is, of course, just the latest wave.
- AP, “Firings, freezes and layoffs: A look at Trump’s moves against federal employees and programs”
- WSJ, “Trump Fires Numerous Inspectors General in Friday Night Purge“
- NYT, “Fired Inspectors General Raise Alarms as Trump Administration Moves to Finalize Purge“
- TAP, “Probationary Federal Employees Targeted for Mass Purge“
- NYT, “Trump Fired E.E.O.C. Commissioners in Late-Night Purge“
- NYT, “Trump Firings at Labor Board Paralyze the Agency”
- Government Executive, “Democrats worry RFK Jr. could purge ‘thousands’ of federal health employees“
That is, I’m sure, an incomplete list.
This is beyond disturbing. It’s routine for incoming Presidents to replace political appointees in policymaking positions. They come into government knowing they serve at the pleasure of the President and fully expect to move on with a change in administration—especially a President of a different party.
Almost all of those being purged here, though, are either career employees entitled to civil service protections and all manner of due process rights or in fixed-term appointments to posts specifically created to be immune from partisan political pressure. These firings are almost certainly illegal. More importantly, they undermine the very fabric of our system of government and administration.
There are already scores of lawsuits underway. Rather clearly, Trump and his team are eagerly testing the legal limits of their power, hoping that a majority-Republican Supreme Court with three Trump-appointed Justices goes along.
A lot of institutional knowledge is being shoved out the door due to the delusions of a shallow, ignorant man.
Typo? I suspect you meant ‘gutting’.
We’ve known that the GOP wants the federal government to be broken since at least Reagan. Trump is just willing to break it openly, now that enough people live in his disinformation bubble that it won’t come back at the GOP when the broken government fails to keep people’s lives from being awful.
Have we reached the point where a general strike by civil servants would actually be both possible and useful? It wouldn’t be any more illegal than day-to-day operations of this ‘administration’.
This is a question out of ignorance but are there powers assumed (or grabbed) by these acting characters that have no basis in fact. Just because someone sends a memo doesn’t mean they have actual authority to send that memo.
This DC air disaster, the most deadly since 9/11, is directly due to the deregulation pushed by Elon Musk – and the other drugged-out incompetent robber barons. Elon pushed out the head of the FAA because FAA also regulates SpaceX.. and nobody paying attention should be shocked that people die when Elon does what he wants.. because Elon wants to kill you.
With the “resignation offer,” if more ATC’s take them up on it, the public safety will be even more at risk. Despite what Elon tells himself while high on ketamine, there simply aren’t masses of people interested in being an air traffic controller.
Republicans want you to die – same as it ever was. The problem Republicans solve is your awareness of the objective reality of the world — they can’t [and don’t] improve anything other than their own corruption from the companies that benefit financially by removing governmental regulation.
@Charley in Cleveland: Charley, this isn’t one person. This is the Republican party. Everything that’s happened is Project2025.
@Scott: It’s almost certain that a lot of these actions are illegal/violate contracts/collective bargaining agreements. The problem is that all of these things will have to be adjudicated, which can take years, and in many cases need to be initially funded by the person suing.
I’m still not clear under what law/regulation the DOGE people are acting, and some people who require Senate confirmation and are not Senate confirmed seem to be trying to take positions pre-confirmation. Any society relies on people of good will to survive. Maybe we’ve just had it too good for too long, while exporting all the chaos elsewhere.
I saw that a Treasury official is leaving because of a clash with Elon Musk about getting access to a secure system used to paying federal salaries and SS benefits. It’s the kind of thing where dumb people think of course Musk should have all the passwords for all the government employees. What can go wrong?
The long march of the anti-government libertarians has always been the march of the witless. You can be cynical and corrupt and have some faculties built-in which allow you to be useful to others. If you want to steal some money, steal some money, but don’t be so demoralizing and victimized while you do it. Don’t have your ideology be this all-consuming drama of your life. Be at least useful to others at a few moments. The only utility Trump is going to produce is more resentment and bitterness amongst his voters.
@Scott and @Kevin: Unlike the first Trump administration, they seem to be complying with the Vacancies Act here. Most of the Actings are career agency employees in the Senior Executive Service. They can be appointed and serve with essentially the full powers of the office for up to 210 days.
I do agree that many of the orders violate civil service laws and/or labor agreements and/or the laws creating various oversight positions.
@Modulo Myself:
For those interested, more details on this (I hope to write about it tomorrow):
https://www.washingtonpost.com/business/2025/01/31/elon-musk-treasury-department-payment-systems/
For the record, it’s fantastic to see everyone who loudly complain about the power of “unelected bureaucrats” celebrate having an unelected advisor (Musk) take a sledgehammer to the Federal Government (or at best remain silent on the issue).
What we are seeing here is the exact opposite of a traditionally conservative approach to governance (and it would be great to have folks who identify as conservative at least agreeing to that proposition).
@Gavin:
While I’m sure there are some truly awful folks in the Republican party who are totally ok with killing people they think deserve it–I think the reality with Musk and many politicians is much more about indifference to harm/death than an actual desire to do harm. That would definitely fit with Musk’s past comments (he seems to be very much of the “cannot make an omelet without breaking eggs, so therefore it’s OK to harm people in persuit of greater goals” type).
From a policy impact perspective, there isn’t that much of a difference (and yes, bad policy decisions will result in deaths). FWIW, is why I think it’s much more important to focus on discussions about realistic projections of policy impact versus the underlying emotional impulses.
Also, the reality is often, in any policy implementation someone, somewhere will be harmed. Pretending otherwise is unproductive. Instead we need to be honest and really try to directly address the potential harms (rather than pretend they don’t exist… as is all too often done by both sides).
—
RE: “While I’m sure there are some truly awful folks in the Republican party who are totally ok with killing people they think deserve it”
As I have made clear in the past, these folks are not restricted to Party. The thing that unites everyone is wanting to harshly pushing people who they thing “deserve it.” The agreement breaks down when we get to who those specific people are.
@Matt Bernius:
I think you can expand that to conservative approach to anything. I saw JD Vance on twitter going after some random writer who has a different take on Jesus and the Gospels. I quote: “He has an IQ of 110 but thinks he has an IQ of 130. This false arrogance drives so much elite failure over the last 40 years.” I can’t tell if this is Vance being calculated and sounding like a loser in order for attention, or if he really thinks being an insecure loser is how a VP should sound.
@Modulo Myself:
Vance, like a lot of people who come from the Alt Right, has an unhealthy focus on IQ (and calipers).
The pushing out of the Treasury official is very concerning, given his role. I was going to link to the WaPo exclusive on that, but I see Matt B. already has.
Literally anyone who says, “no, you can’t do that” is being let go/forced out/summarily fired.
This is very much a purge of anyone who dares to stand up to these fools.
We’re only 10 days into Trump and The Enablers 2.0 and I’m already exhausted. Yet, I understand this is the point – they want us numb to the outrages before they move on to the truly pernicious stuff. I want to turn it all off, but I shouldn’t give them what they want by ignoring it.
So, I’ve created a basic template I can cut/paste into comments or letters to the editors. Part one will be a simple declaration:
Then, I’m going to reference Steven’s Defining Fascism post and simply check-off the elements that apply in the Outrage of the Day. For example, Trump and The Enablers’ response to the DC airplane tragedy:
I’ll just have these ready to go, so I can shine a spotlight on what matters with the daily dumpster fire, while not giving all my energy to the dark side like they want.
@Gavin: In deference to the debate on lying and truthing from yesterday, may I suggest that instead of the hyperbolic “(r)epublicans want you to die – same as it ever was,” a retreat to a more honest (as well as kinder and gentler*) “republicans are less concerned about people dying than they are about the size of government activity from which they don’t solely benefit–same as it ever was.”
It loses rhetorical impact, I’ll grant, but less hyperbole can only be a net positive in times such as these.
*h/t to George W. Bush, famous RINO
@Matt Bernius: This good governance conservative agrees.
@Matt Bernius:
The editor of Wired was saying last night that per their reporting, Musk is functionally the head of the government right now, with Trump serving as head of state. THEN that article came out. Real bad signs all around of a complete government takeover by an unelected oligarch.
I wonder what the typical FBI agent thinks these days. They are generally pretty old fashioned Republicans, I believe. How were the forced out individuals regarded by their peers? Will every president from now on purge various watchdogs from the last administration?
@Gavin:
As much as I hate to defend such a horrible person, FAA understaffing has been a problem for years, and while the new administration is certainly going out of its way to make things worse in the future, it’s kind of foolish to act like conditions in the DCA tower measurably changed in the last 10 days.
@Kevin:
Good point!! Years ago, at the job I left when the company was sold and came under new administration ironically enough, the new CEO ordered all the senior managers in another division (sound familiar?) than mine terminated. The reason he gave was that he didn’t want people their (advancing) ages in his organization.
Told that his actions was entirely against the law, (it was reported to me) he said he knew and didn’t care. They were exempt from the contract and would have to sue to get relief. He was rich enough* that he could keep them in court until they ran out of money and had to withdraw.
Trump, with the force and resources of government at his neck and call, has the same situation. Things are no longer as dire for these employees as back in 1985, but this dispute could easily extend beyond this administration and there’s no reason to believe that a sufficiently RTW SCOTUS wouldn’t find for the administration anyway.
*Another claim to fame of the new CEO at my company was that he paid the largest fine for illegal bundling of campaign funds during Reagan’s entire administration, in 1980. The story goes that he appeared in person at the Clerk’s office and wrote a personal check for something on the order of $2.5 million on site.
Before I tiptoe away, I’ll note that things are not dire. If Trump gets too lawless, Congress still has impeachment available.
@Matt Bernius: The argument, going back to probably before you were born because I was in college, was always “we want OUR unelected bureaucrats in charge, not THEIRS!”
@just nutha:
Oh completely. This is similar to “we have thoughtful judges who just call balls and strikes, THEY have ACTIVIST JUDGES who rewrite the law.”
Of course, we’ve also seen many situations when “our” judges suddenly become “activists” when they reach the “wrong” decision.
@Matt Bernius:
I suspect that the current cohort are too emersed in political partisanship to make the mistakes of the past. For the near future (and a non-insignificant part of the near past IMO) the “independent judiciary” is ovah.
@just nutha: I can’t tell if that’s sarcasm or not. I’d argue that things are that dire, and that Congress should have impeached after the spending freeze was declared, something that explicitly violates laws passed by Congress. I’ve been calling my Senators daily, telling them that if they can’t do everything they can to obstruct what’s happening, as the Republicans have in the past, they need to resign immediately. According to one of them, he hasn’t seen people this aroused in years. So that’s going well.
The career functionaries have bragged about their actions to impede Trump’s first administration by delay and selective information to political appointees. They obviously did not believe Trump would make it back into office.
But it was more than just Trump. I heard recently that the Heritage Foundation filed around 1500 FOIA requests since 2021 on individuals in government to determine who were the bad actors. So the Administration knows where to look. Sure some actions will be overturned, but right now the impediments are not in the office where they can do damage.
And what you need to fear is that these actions might spur lower level employees who aren’t Democrat partisans to step up now that the petty bosses are out of the office.
@JKB:
So you acknowledge that this is all being designed and pushed by a private, conservative think tank that is not an elected body, is not accountable to the voters, and is operating at the direction of corporate/political activists.
A question for all of the Republicans and Trump supporters on this blog: is this really what you want? Agencies stripped of all institutional knowledge, and instead stuffed full of political hacks and yes-men? If so, you do realize, I hope, that is how corruption really takes hold. Y’all are a bunch of hypocrites.
@Kevin: My apologies. Of course it was sarcasm. I thought everyone by now realized that no one’s ever getting impeached and convicted. On a more serious, completely non-sarcastic note, my thinking has evolved to a cynical position that it’s possible that “the Founders” created impeachment to create the illusion that the people at the top “aren’t above the law.”
@Stormy Dragon:
People don’t work in a vacuum. Having your agency and job security destabilized by erratic firings and buyout offers would almost certainly have a negative effect on one’s job performance.
It isn’t foolish to believe morale is likely considerably down — anxiety, distractedness and brain fog way up — in the DCA tower in the last 10 days, and wherever else Americans are working, civil servants and private citizens alike.
Trump and Musk’s reckless implementation of Project 2025 is already making Americans less safe. Their extremist actions thus far are not without impact.
Speaking of, has any reporter yet asked Trump why he campaigned on lying about Project 2025?
@just nutha: Good one
As with all of these power abuses, the question is who is going to stop him? And the answer is … no one.
@Hal_10000: And even if someone steps up to, what tool is available to stop him. Say all you want about the rule of law, by the time it resolves the outcome, the damage will be done.
Effectively, it’s already is done now, on day 10. It was already done on election day.
MAGA!
A Bay Area airport near SFO is losing all its air traffic controllers starting this weekend
All this is priced in. We all know what Trump is, we all know what he’s doing, none of this is a surprise. I’m getting tired of our side being reactive. You don’t win by letting the enemy hold the initiative.
What we need is a unifying vision, and quick consensus on how to market that vision. Holding Trump’s feet to the fire may weaken him but it does not automatically follow that we are strengthened. Enough with analyzing, ‘them,’ let’s start looking at how in the fuck we lost to these assholes, and how in the fuck we’re going to destroy them and save this country.
He hasn’t posted here in a while, but I’m genuinely curious if commenter Andy (whose posts I almost always appreciate) still thinks what Trump is doing is mostly within the scope of his authority.
@Michael Reynolds:
There was a global anti-incumbent wave and our nominee was a black woman.
It’s really not that deep. So most people will not waste three more months hemming, hawing, and playing dumb — like there’s some grand big Agatha Christie code here that needs to be cracked.
The barbarians are over the walls and inside the bailey. This is not time for “how.” This is time for “do.” There’s no Grand New Idea that’s going to make everybody hold hands and start singing kumbaya. The US Constitution is what unites Americans, either you’re gonna stand up for it or you’re not. What unifies Bill Kristol with Bernie Sanders is that Nazis are trying to kill them. When the barrel is pointing in their faces, they should already be fighting.
I mentioned in the Bill Kristol thread that Ross Douthat, Kristol’s replacement at NYT, interviewed Steve Bannon (gift link). It changed my appreciation of the situation. Given recent discussion here, one must first note that the interview is a tissue of well-constructed lies, misdirection, and evasion. Bannon did a lot of anti- elite, anti-globalist stuff, and made a big deal out of opposition to the “tech Broligarchs”, his phrase. He also talked a lot about economic and cultural populism. They talked a lot about Trump’s first term, kind of admitted there hadn’t been much economic populism, then mutually walked away from drawing any dangerous conclusions. Bannon at one point says Trump is,
Piling it high.
The upshot is that Douthat and Bannon seem to think they’ve shown how deep Trump is into economic populism and how Bannon is fighting the oligarchs. What I take from it is that I’ve been wrong. I’ve thought there’s be a fight and Bannon would get spit out. After reading this, I think they’ll keep him on, as a court jester. He can make fun of who he wants, he can make a lot of money off his various hustles, but he’ll have no influence over policy, and he’s OK with this role. He’s content to be seen as a populist critic while paradoxically, by pretending he has some influence, he helps maintain the populist façade. Meanwhile, the oligarchs run wild. Also, Kid Sulzberger gets a Quisling gold star for running this in NYT.
@Charley in Cleveland:
To me, this is exactly what Steve Bannon and the Heritage Foundation 2025 Project had in mind, and Trump is the front man/strong man/entertainer who has the temperament to do what the Radical Right wants.
Democrats have to learn how to fight this kind of opposition. I think current Democratic Party leadership, people like Chuck Schumer, is ossified.
They have to get a new look.
@DK:
Thank you. And like all VP’s she had been out of sight, then had three months to campaign against someone with more name recognition than God. And have I mentioned the electorate are a box of rocks?
The question isn’t, “Why did Harris lose?” The question is, “Why was this even close?” Dems have a long record of solid government, the GOPs have nothing to offer the median voter except FOX/GOP propaganda.
@gVOR10:
I’m curious exactly what is your beef with rocks, that you defame them this way often.
@just nutha:
Bwa haha hahahaha hahahahahaha, gasp, wheeze, ha ha.
Whoo-eee, that’s a good one, Cracker.
@just nutha:
Maybeso. OTOH, neither of us would have been invited to any of the founders’ homes for dinner, eh?
@DK:
You are not a wartime consigliere.
@Michael Reynolds: True. I’m a warrior of a tribe that rose from slavery to get a black guy in the White House, in this racist-ass country. Such an effort requires a) loyalty and b) focus.
Too many liberals can’t stay laser focused on today’s fight, distracted by perpetual cycles of backbiting and recrimination over shit that’s dead, done and buried. When instead we need to stick together.
Same thing happened after Biden’s debate disaster. As Kathy has rightly pointed out, the weeks of durm and strang were more damaging than the actual debate. What was needed in that moment was for the entire party to join black voters in saying well that sucked, but that’s over, this is our guy, let’s focus on Trump.
If we could get enough good white people keep the focus on real enemies — instead of playing the blame game and/or panicking and running for the hills to have a circular firing squad when shit gets hot — then we could get more to join the black voters who still pick Dems at an 85% clip.
No, we do not need more months of weeping, gnashing of teeth, and infighting about “why” and “how” in search of some magical grand unifying kumbaya super special perfect ‘messaging’ vision that does not exist in this rowdy, multicultural American tapestry and never will.
The election is over. (And spoiler alert: the incumbent party was never going to win it.) The lame duck break is also over. As of Jan 20, the Nazis are in the White House. Any consigliere whose battle plan is to waste more time crying about the past should probably retire.
@gVOR10:
Harris was more helped than hurt by the shortened campaign.
When Hillary left Obama’s State Department, she polled as one of America’s most popular figures. The more time Americans spend with an active politicians, the less we like them.
Knowing what we know now about the post-COVID political climate, the moment it was clear Biden needed a black woman running mate to win the 2020 election, the 2024 election was already likely lost. Even if Biden had bowed out in 2023, Harris was going to win the 2024 Dem primary. What wooden soldier would’ve outraised her or generated more campaign trail excitement? Andy Beshear? Roy Cooper? Not likely.
Harris was always going to replace Biden no matter when or how it happened, and there was no chance the US was going to elect a black woman from the incumbent party in 2024.
It’s a popular fantasy that voter behavior is controlled by what Democrats do and don’t do, as the dogma of our political religion says neither Republicans nor voters themselves ever have any agency or responsibility. But it’s a myth. “If only progressives had done that” and “If only Harris had simply distanced herself” and “If only Biden had not run” are at this point just comforting Bible stories, or trivial water cooler chat.
Like I have to tell disappointed clients in therapy, the way that happened was probably out of anyone’s control. What matters now is the response. All this election shoulda, coulda, woulda has no utility. Dems should be demanding Trump’s Republican oligarchy solve all the many problems they promised to fix — and pointing out those problems daily.
@DK:
Too many people want a “strong” President and think that requires a penis haver.
So I think mostly no vagina havers. Black is just the cherry on the shit sundae.