On April 23, the Trump administration formally published a rulemaking proposal in the Federal Register that would lay the legal groundwork for creating a new category of civil service personnel called “Schedule Policy/Career” — better known as “Schedule F.” Long anticipated, this policy would strip civil service employees of century-old employment protections, effectively making them “at will” employees, much like a president’s political appointees.
This change is not merely inside-the-Beltway “inside baseball,” either. These legal protections are exactly why we can count on a professional and apolitical corps of thousands of experts to ensure our drinking water is free of contaminants and our planes land safely.
While important under all circumstances, these protections are especially crucial when facing a worst-case scenario like we are now. President Donald Trump has made it clear that he intends to purge career civil servants for insufficient loyalty and to replace them with hacks who will follow any order from above, no matter how illegal or contrary to the public interest.
Tellingly, the proposal itself provides an unintentional demonstration of why a professional civil service is so crucial in a complex, industrialized democracy like ours. Its policy analysis is often conclusory or superficial. Supporting evidence is scant and even nonexistent. Worst of all, it lacks serious consideration of more tailored policy alternatives that would address the problems it identifies — for instance, better accountability for poor performing career staff — that are supported by evidence and permissible by law.
These are all the indicia of the kind of reason-based, deliberative decision-making administrative law requires for new rules. And it is the role of career staff at agencies to make sure that new rules meet these standards. This proposal is Exhibit A for what happens when you cut career civil servants out of the policy formulation process, and it substantially increases the likelihood that the final version of the rule, if one emerges, will meet a quick demise in the courts.
This action triggers a 30-day public comment period, which ends on May 23.
