The Office of Personnel Management (OPM) recently proposed a new rule which claims to “increase career employment accountability.” FABBS previously reported on this proposal in detail, which you can read here. Put simply, the Trump administration aims to reclassify certain civil services workers as “at-will” employees, making it easier to fire them and replace them with political appointees. This rule, if adopted, sets the stage for the Trump administration to lay off more than 50,000 federal employees, roughly 2 percent of the federal workforce.
As with any proposed rule, the federal government must initiate a comment period during which the general public can give their thoughts on the policy, indicating whether they support or oppose it. Before finalizing the rule, OPM must consider all relevant comments and may revise the rule based on those comments before officially adopting it. As of writing, nearly 30,000 comments have been submitted by individual citizens and organizations.
FABBS recently submitted our own comments, echoing the concerns of many and explaining our strong opposition to the Schedule F plan. We cautioned OPM that the proposed rule would threaten the integrity of science-based governance and the federal agencies that support it. We argued that the proposed rule will:
- undermine scientific integrity and evidence-based policy;
- compromise the impartial administration of science funding;
- jeopardize the federal scientific workforce;
- put impartial scientists at risk if findings contradict the administration; and
- erode public trust in federal science and data.
Readers interested in submitting their own comments can do so here. The deadline to submit is Saturday, June 7 at 11:59pm ET.
FABBS will continue to monitor this proposal and its impact on our sciences.
