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Employees represented by NTEU are now indefinitely shielded from being RIF’d during the government shutdown and the judge's 47-page written order has some strong words for the administration.
“The record before the Court paints a chaotic picture, with employees wondering what is happening and no one at the agencies able to guide them,” U.S. District Judge Susan Illston wrote about the RIF notices that went out Oct. 10 at multiple agencies.
She called the 4,000 layoff notices sent during the shutdown – which one administration official has said could exceed 10,000 – “unprecedented in our country’s history.”
Illston’s order blocks any further shutdown-related layoffs and pauses the 60-day clock on the RIF notices that were already sent since the start of the shutdown Oct. 1. The order covers employees represented by multiple unions across government.
The judge for the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of California found that the unions are likely to prevail on the merits of their case that the shutdown layoffs are illegal.