A federal judge has placed a temporary hold on President Trump's 'Fork in the Road' initiative, which offered federal employees full salary and benefits through September if they resigned by February 6. The program, aimed at reducing federal bureaucracy, faced legal challenges from labor unions who argued it violated administrative procedures and lacked clarity. The judge scheduled a hearing for Monday to further address the legality of the offer.
A federal judge on Thursday temporarily blocked President Donald Trump 's 'Fork in the Road' initiative, aimed at incentivizing over two million federal workers to resign as part of a sweeping effort to reduce the bureaucratic workforce. The Trump administration, in collaboration with Elon Musk's Department of Government Efficiency, has been aggressively pursuing federal bureaucracy reduction since Trump took office.
The White House announced the offer in an email on January 28 from the Office of Personnel and Management. The email stated that federal employees would receive full salary and benefits through the end of September if they resigned before February 6. U.S. District Judge George O'Toole Jr., without commenting on the offer's legality, scheduled a hearing for Monday afternoon to address the matter. He also extended the deadline for workers to decide whether to resign, originally set for Thursday at 11:59 p.m. ET, to at least Monday after the hearing. 'I enjoined the defendants from taking any action to implement the so-called directive pending the completion of briefing and oral argument on the issues,' said O'Toole. 'I believe that's as far as I want to go today.' Moments after O'Toole issued his ruling, White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt announced that 40,000 government employees had accepted the administration's offer for a deferred resignation, meaning they would stop working but continue to be paid through September 30. O'Toole's ruling came in response to lawsuits filed by multiple labor unions challenging the Trump administration's 'Fork in the Road' offer. The American Federation of Government Employees (AFGE), in its lawsuit, alleged that the Office of Personnel Management (OPM) violated the Administrative Procedures Act by launching the deferred resignation offer without clarifying if it had the funding or a structured implementation plan. The AFGE's lawsuit stated that 'The Fork Directive is arbitrary and capricious in numerous respects, including that the Directive: (1) fails to consider possible adverse consequences of the Directive provided to millions of federal employees to the continuing functioning of government; (2) offers conflicting information about employees' rights and obligations if they accept the government's offer; (3) runs counter to long-standing rules and requirements for federal employees; (4) is contrary to reasoned practices of government restructuring, (5) ignores history and practices around effective workforce reduction, (6) sets an arbitrarily short deadline; and (7) is pretext for removing and replacing government workers on an ideological basis,' Everett Kelley, the national president of AFGE, issued a statement saying, 'We are pleased the court temporarily paused this deadline while arguments are heard about the legality of the deferred resignation program. We continue to believe this program violates the law, and we will continue to aggressively defend our members' rights.' Leavitt, in response, said of the 40,000 workers who accepted the White House's offer to resign, 'We expect that number to increase. We encourage federal workers in this city to accept the very generous offer.' O'Toole set the next hearing in the matter for Monday at 2 p.m. ET. It's unclear whether the 40,000 employees who accepted the White House's offer have the option to withdraw their acceptance until Monday afternoon
FEDERAL WORKERS RESIGNATION TRUMP 'FORK IN THE ROAD' BUREAUCRACY LAWSUIT LABOR UNIONS
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