WASHINGTON — President Donald Trump signed an Executive Order reclassifying approximately 8,000 policy-influencing federal positions into a new category called Schedule Policy/Career, making it significantly easier for agencies to remove employees who perform poorly, engage in misconduct, or resist presidential directives.
The order targeted the highest-ranking career positions outside of the Senior Executive Service, with 97 percent of the reclassified roles at the GS-15 or Senior Level pay grade. Affected positions include agency directors, deputy directors, chiefs of staff, advisors and policy analysts, public affairs and legislative affairs leaders, employees involved in drafting regulations and guidance, and employees with significant roles in determining federal grant recipients.
Under the new classification, agencies can remove employees in Schedule Policy/Career without the lengthy procedural hurdles that have historically made federal employee removals difficult. The White House said removal decisions would be made without respect to political affiliation and that the non-partisan hiring processes and competitive status of the positions would remain unchanged.
The administration framed the order as a response to what it described as a broken federal personnel system in which removal and appeal processes often take more than a year, allowing employees to remain in policy roles despite poor performance, misconduct, or active resistance to presidential priorities. The White House cited polling in which a plurality of federal employees in Washington said they would ignore a lawful order from Trump they considered bad policy, and noted that during Trump’s first term, career employees refused to assist on policy matters including prosecuting racial discrimination in higher education and drafting Title IX reform rules.
The order built on Executive Order 13957, which Trump issued during his first term to create a similar at-will classification for policy employees. President Biden revoked that order upon taking office and issued regulations designed to prevent future administrations from reinstating it. Trump restored the original order on his first day back in office, and the Office of Personnel Management subsequently rescinded the Biden-era regulations that had blocked its implementation.
The White House said the federal workforce has already been reduced to its lowest level since 1966 under Trump, following voluntary buyout programs that drew large participation.