The Trump administration asked the Supreme Court on Monday for an emergency stay of a district court judge’s decision that 16,000 federal probationary employees terminated in February across six agencies and departments be immediately reinstated.
Acting Solicitor General Sarah Harris filed an application Monday to “stay the injunction” issued by U.S. District Judge William Alsup of the Northern District of California that had ordered the Trump administration on March 13 to “”immediately offer reinstatement to any and all probationary employees terminated on or about February 13th and 14th 2025.” Alsup’s order earlier this month required six agencies — the Departments of Veterans Affairs, Agriculture, Defense, Energy, Interior and Treasury — to reinstate probationary workers fired last month. Alsup’s order covered federal workers who were still in probationary status, or those generally in a one- or two-year trial period. The judge said the terminations were likely unlawful because the Office of Personnel Management did not have the authority to direct the firings.
Harris argued in the filing that the labor unions and nonprofit groups that challenged the mass firings lack standing, saying they have “hijacked the employment relationship between the federal government and its workforce,” claiming the judge’s order also violates separation of powers. Harris wrote: “This Court should not allow a single district court to erase Congress’s handiwork and seize control over reviewing federal personnel decisions — much less do so by vastly exceeding the limits on the scope of its equitable authority and ordering reinstatements en masse.”
Harris urged the high court to “end the interbranch power grab … Those orders have sown chaos as the Executive Branch scrambles to meet immediate compliance deadlines by sending huge sums of government money out the door, reinstating thousands of lawfully terminated workers, undoing steps to restructure Executive Branch agencies, and more. The lower courts should not be allowed to transform themselves into all-purpose overseers of Executive Branch hiring, firing, contracting, and policymaking.”
The firings of probationary workers is being undertaken by the White House’s Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE). More than 24,000 probationary workers were removed from their positions as part of the mass firings, involving 18 agencies.
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