Trump seeks to limit legal options for fired US government workers
Under a new proposal, workers would dispute their firings to a Trump-led agency, not an independent board
The Trump administration is trying to make it more difficult for fired federal employees to contest their dismissal, according to a government plan released on Monday, by limiting their right to appeal their dismissal to an independent board.
The Office of Personnel Management (OPM), the federal government’s human resources office, proposed ending the right of fired federal employees to dispute dismissals before the independent Merit Systems Protection Board, according to the plan.
Trump has made mass sackings of government employees a centrepiece of his second term. At the same time, he has undermined avenues for those same workers to dispute their dismissals, including by firing members of government offices that enforce job protections for federal employees.
The Merit Systems Protection Board, the organisation listed in Monday’s proposal, mediates disputes between federal workers and their employers. The board saw a spike in new cases after Trump took office for the second time.
The board’s caseload jumped 266 per cent from October 1, 2024 to September 30, 2025, according to government records, compared with the same period the year before.