\n<\/p>\n
The U.S. Office of Personnel Management\u2019s controversial policy creating a new federal employee category with fewer job protections took effect this week.<\/p>\n
The Trump administration is set to transfer an unknown number of workers into this classification. Research advocates worry federal grant-making employees will be among them, making them easier to pressure and fire. The policy, released for public comment last spring, has prompted vocal pushback. By the OPM\u2019s own count, 94\u00a0percent of the more than 40,500 public comments it received opposed the plan.<\/p>\n
Federally funded researchers and groups advocating for them raised concerns about the category, called Schedule Policy\/Career. It\u2019s better known as Schedule F, the name the first Trump administration used for the policy, which President Biden rescinded. Employees in this new category are easier to fire, lacking due process and appeal rights. The rule is part of the administration\u2019s sweeping effort to reshape the federal workforce\u2014an effort that has included mass layoffs of civil servants at agencies such as the Education Department and the National Institutes of Health. <\/p>\n
The final rule says federal research funding agencies, such as the NIH and the National Science Foundation, can\u2014with presidential approval\u2014move employees involved in federal grant making into this less protected group of workers. That has fed worries that the administration will further politicize billions of dollars in research funding, after a year in which it already canceled grants in droves. <\/p>\n
Here are five things to know about the change. <\/p>\n
Workers moved into the new category won\u2019t be protected by \u201cadverse action\u201d and \u201cperformance-based action\u201d procedures, which provide many federal employees due process protections against firing and other punishments. They also generally won\u2019t be able to appeal discipline to the Merit Systems Protection Board, an independent federal agency. <\/p>\n
Concerns that a wide swath of employees at the science agencies will be reclassified are \u201cbuttressed more by fear than actual evidence,\u201d OPM officials wrote in response to public comments.<\/p>\n
Instead, the agency expects few workers will be placed in the new, less protected category, even though the policy opens up that possibility for many employees. The president will ultimately decide, through executive order, who is transferred. <\/p>\n
\u201cCommenter 18409 argues that it makes no sense to reclassify all the reviewers, program officers, advisory councils, and leadership at science funding agencies as political in nature,\u201d the agency wrote. But OPM said such positions are eligible for transfer. <\/p>\n
\u201cSome positions in scientific grantmaking influence public policy,\u201d the OPM wrote. \u201cThose positions, as well as any others that are policy-influencing, are appropriate candidates.”<\/p>\n
But OPM also said it won\u2019t be recommending for reclassification the many grant-making positions that don\u2019t \u201cdetermine or make agency policy.\u201d It expects the scientific jobs that agencies identify for transfer will \u201creflect policy-influencing duties that, for example, directs [sic<\/em>] which scientific projects should be resourced throughout the agency.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cOPM expects that, generally, relatively few of these line scientific, cybersecurity, or technical positions will be moved into Schedule Policy\/Career because most do not perform policy-influencing work,\u201d the agency wrote. It said commenters concerned about politics eroding public trust in science \u201coverstate the impact on agencies\u2019 scientific missions and the scientific community as a whole.\u201d<\/p>\n The Association of American Medical Colleges, which opposed the policy, noted in its comment on the proposal that \u201cother estimations suggest it could be four times\u201d OPM\u2019s estimate. Neither OPM nor three major research funding agencies\u2014the NIH, the National Science Foundation and the Defense Department\u2014answered Inside Higher Ed<\/em>\u2019s questions about how many workers, and which kinds, they plan to reclassify. <\/p>\n \u201cNSF is going to decline to comment at this time,\u201d a spokesperson there said in an email. <\/p>\n OPM\u2019s rule says agencies have already recommended positions to convert, and it \u201ccan state that its initial estimate of 50,000 positions was a reasonable approximation.\u201d It projected that 45,000 of those will be current employees and the rest new hires. <\/p>\n More than two\u00a0million civilian employees make up the federal workforce.<\/p>\n OPM\u2019s explanation of its rule and its response to comments describe democratic accountability and obedience to President Trump as synonymous. <\/p>\n \u201cCritical to the success of any presidency is the ability to implement an agenda endorsed by the American people free from antidemocratic, unaccountable bureaucratic resistance,\u201d the agency wrote.<\/p>\n \u201cThis will allow agencies to quickly remove employees from critical positions who engage in misconduct, perform poorly, or obstruct the democratic process by intentionally subverting Presidential directives,\u201d OPM said, adding that the policy \u201cspecifies increasing accountability to the President as grounds for excepting positions from the competitive service.\u201d<\/p>\n At the same time, the agency says it\u2019s fighting partisanship, arguing that the new category \u201cwill give agencies the practical ability to separate employees who insert partisanship into their official duties.\u201d And OPM suggests the new category will still allow employees to voice dissent. <\/p>\n \u201cOPM expects that employees who provide frank and candid advice, then faithfully implement agency leadership\u2019s ultimate decision irrespective of their personal preferences, have nothing to fear from Schedule Policy\/Career,\u201d it wrote. And it said Trump doesn\u2019t disdain federal workers. <\/p>\n \u201cCommenters overlook the many times the President has praised and lauded Federal employees as a whole, including in public proclamations,\u201d it wrote. \u201cThe President has also praised specific categories of Federal employees, such as when he told Immigration and Customs Enforcement employees \u2018we love you, we support you, and we will always have your back.\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n A group of unions, Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington, Democracy Forward, and Public Employees for Environmental Responsibility have sued Trump, OPM and its director, asking a judge to rule that the executive order and policy establishing the new category violate the Constitution, civil service protections and other laws.<\/p>\n \u201cPresident Trump and Director [Scott] Kupor can have whatever views they want of the career civil service,\u201d the plaintiffs wrote in a filing in the case. \u201cWhat they cannot do is ignore the law and disregard Congress\u2019s design.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cWithout talented career employees\u2019 expertise, presidential administrations would be significantly limited in their ability to implement their agendas, and the operations of the federal government\u2014everything from Social Security to national parks\u2014would grind to a halt,\u201d they wrote.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" The U.S. Office of Personnel Management\u2019s controversial policy creating a new federal employee category with fewer job protections took effect this week. The Trump administration is set to transfer an unknown number of workers into this classification. Research advocates worry federal grant-making employees will be among them, making them easier to pressure and fire. The<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":46604,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[57],"tags":[319,4639,779,1235,3015,2678],"class_list":{"0":"post-46603","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-education","8":"tag-federal","9":"tag-grant","10":"tag-job","11":"tag-lose","12":"tag-makers","13":"tag-protections"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/46603","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=46603"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/46603\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/46604"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=46603"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=46603"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=46603"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}3. <\/span>The OPM estimated 50,000 federal workers total will be in Schedule Policy\/Career. But that number is contested.<\/h4>\n
4.<\/span> The policy says it will strengthen democracy\u2014by ensuring federal workers obey the president.<\/strong><\/h4>\n
5.<\/span> Employees and their unions are trying to stop this.<\/h4>\n