February 9, 2025

by Stephen Stofka

This Super Bowl weekend, I’ll take a short break from the debate series and take a brief look at the Federal workforce. Next week I hope to have a debate on the Central Power of the Federal Government.

Since Donald Trump took the oath of office on January 20^th, he has enlisted Elon Musk to head an effort to trim the civilian federal workforce (CFW). These employees do not include the men and women serving in the Armed Forces. Musk leads an unofficial department called the Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) designated by President Trump to root out “waste, fraud and abuse.” Several lawsuits have challenged the authority and methods of DOGE to make personnel decisions. Several DOGE employees have access to personal credit and medical information but have not passed a background check (Source). This is a fluid situation sparking controversies each day. I wanted to understand the structure of the CFW as a context for this evolving story.

CFW employees fall into one of two categories: competitive service workers who must pass examinations to be hired and advance within the organization, and political appointees who are excepted from such requirements. The former are permanent or career employees and serve under several Presidential administrations regardless of the party of the President. This system promotes stability within a shifting political environment and was a response to the former system of patronage. The latter are temporary employees and leave the CFW when a new President takes office. Within each classification, there are several subcategories. For interested readers, I will list the various classes of employees in the notes.

Last summer the Partnership for Public Service published an analysis of 2023 data from the Office of Personnel and Management (OPM), the HR agency of the of the federal government (Source). There were over two million permanent full-time employees in the CFW, an increase of 140,000, or 7% from 2019 levels. OPM lists the current level of the CFW at 2.2 million (Source). The majority of the increase was in response to the Bipartisan Infrastructure Law passed in 2021, the first year of the Biden administration, when the Democrats held a “trifecta,” all three branches of government. The law benefited both red and blue states but has been criticized for the embarrassing flaws in its implementation.

The bill contained $42 billion to expand internet access, particularly to rural areas. Nothing has been connected yet. Over $7 billion was earmarked for electric vehicle charging stations but fewer than fifty have been built. To provide some comparison, consider the case of a Denver suburb that hired HDR, a private company, to complete a full renovation of a county library, expand the building and construct four charging stations (Source). HDR completed the project in three years, roughly the same time period since the passage of the 2021 law. Federal projects are plagued with a cumbersome process that makes delays inevitable and diminishes public confidence in the competence of the federal government. When President Trump and Elon Musk claim that they can fix the problem, their supporters believe them.

President Trump would like to undo much of what his predecessor, President Biden, accomplished. Trump could argue that he is simply resizing the CFW to pre-pandemic levels. According to the Partnership for Public Service, 71% of the CFW is defense or national security related. Twenty-one percent of federal employees are in the Department of Veterans Affairs (Source). Cuts to those programs will be unpopular with MAGA supporters and Republican lawmakers. Fifteen percent are medical personnel, some hired during the Covid crisis, and might become a target for dismissal. Many of those provide medical service to active military and veterans. USAID and the EPA have long been targets of Republican condemnation. Trump says he wants to close USAID. The EPA could be next. In response to several lawsuits, the courts will have to decide whether the executive branch has any authority to eliminate a department or agency created by Congress.

Excluding Postal Service workers, there are 2.2 million employees in the CFW (Source). Only 9000 are political appointees and listed in the OPM’s Plum Book (Source). President Trump wants to follow through on an executive order he signed just before the 2020 election that was rescinded by Biden (Source). That order envisioned a plan to convert 50,000 federal employees into a new type of political appointee called Schedule F that would be loyal to Trump’s policies (Source).  

In his first term, Trump became convinced that career civil service employees were sabotaging the policies of his administration. Political appointees carrying out the policies of then President Trump were frustrated by the delaying tactics of career employees who may not have agreed with those policies (Source). Many career employees have done their jobs for both Democratic and Republican administrations. They would claim that they are loyal to the law, not to any one President. Although Trump took an oath to uphold and faithfully execute the laws, his loyalty is to his opinion and vision, not the law. He follows the tradition of President Nixon, who believed that the three branches of government are not co-equal. Nixon regarded his interpretation of the law as the law.

The appointment system is bit complicated but is designed to balance power and interests. President Trump is used to running a family business and does not like checks and balances because they diminish his power. On the other hand, voters elected the President, and he should be able to have some confidence in the personnel who execute public policy. Career civil service employees are a welcome alternative to the patronage system that existed in the 19^th and early part of the 20^th century. However, a large class of employees with virtual tenure can become insulated from the public will. Those employees can develop a culture that is resistant to policy changes. Within the context of a CFW of more than two million employees, shifting the status of 50,000 employees can seem modest to some. Does the executive have the authority? Will the courts and Congress stand by while the executive alters a workforce structure constructed by Congress?

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The first type of position are presidential appointees with Senate confirmation (PAS). These positions promote a balance of power between Senators and the President.

The second type of position are Presidential appointees that do not need Senate confirmation. This gives the President the autonomy to build an executive team that will implement the policies he wants. These make up 5% of appointees.

The Senior Executive SES-NA and SES-GEN appointees make up half of the SES class and almost half of all 9000 appointees. The other half of SES employees are filled by career appointees on a competitive basis to ensure some impartiality.

The Schedule C (SC or SL) positions allow agency heads to place key policymakers with some expertise in an agency but only after approval by the Office of Personnel Management, a check on political discretion (Source).

The Schedule C (XS) statutory positions legislated by Congress strike a balance of Presidential discretion and Congressional policymaking. Most of these positions are in agencies with financial functions or international jurisdictions like USAID. They are GS-15 or lower and Congress has exempted them from competitive hiring (Source).