Mass purge of federal workers creates chaos across agencies — and other labor news

Yahoo

21-02-2025

President Trump's purge of federal workers has gutted the ranks of wildland firefighters. (U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service)
Take a seat in the Break Room, our weekly round-up of labor news in Minnesota and beyond. This week: Mass firings create chaos across federal agencies; HealthPartners office workers announce three-day strike; confirmation uncertain for Trump's secretary of labor pick; and Rep. Michelle Fischbach looks to repeal Biden's nursing home staffing levels.
The federal civilian workforce of 2.3 million people is in chaos as the Trump administration's so-called Department of Government Efficiency, led by world's richest man Elon Musk, rips through agencies with indiscriminate firings of upwards of 200,000 employees.
The U.S. Department of Agriculture laid off workers responding to the bird flu but is now trying to 'swiftly' rehire them. The Department of Energy laid off about 325 workers who maintain the nation's nuclear weapons arsenal and then rescinded most of the notices. The Department of Health and Human Services laid off 950 Indian Health Services employees before rescinding those notices.
A Minnesota worker for the Small Business Administration was fired, then rehired, then fired again in a matter of days, the Star Tribune reported in a story featuring terminated workers at the Voyageurs National Park, the Department of Housing and Urban Development and the General Service Administration.
The Trump administration has also said 'You're fired' to firefighters, aviation safety workers, disaster response workers and cybersecurity personnel, among thousands of others. Some workers who accepted DOGE's suspiciously generous buy-out offer were fired instead with no severance.
It's unclear how many of the roughly 18,000 federal employees in Minnesota have been laid off. The Office of Personnel Management did not respond to a request for data on layoffs affecting Minnesota workers.
Unions have tried to intervene, but their lawsuit aiming to block the firings was unsuccessful.
The purge of federal workers — which has included many Trump supporters — is worrying some Republican lawmakers, though not enough to do anything more than pleading.
Alaska Sen. Lisa Murkowski said 'indiscriminate workforce cuts aren't efficient and won't fix the federal budget,' while Louisiana Sen. Bill Cassidy said he supports downsizing the government but not by firing new FBI agents.
The cuts have disproportionately hurt veterans because the federal government is the nation's leading employer of veterans: About 30% of the federal workforce are veterans compared to less than 6% in the private sector.
State Sen. Grant Hauschild, DFL-Hermantown, sent a letter to President Trump asking him to reverse the cuts to the U.S. Forest Service in the Superior National Forest and the Boundary Waters Canoe Area Wilderness.
'The decision to cut these positions does not merely affect numbers on a budget sheet — it affects real people, real families, and entire communities that rely on these jobs. It undermines the efforts of those who have committed their lives to public service, often at the cost of personal sacrifice, and diminishes the well-being of the very communities they serve,' Hauschild wrote.
The union representing some 1,000 HealthPartners office support workers announced a three-day strike beginning March 3 at approximately 30 facilities unless they reach a deal on a new contract.
Front desk workers and other office support employees with OPEIU Local 12 voted overwhelmingly to authorize a strike earlier this month, citing 'drastic' increases to workers' health care costs.
Other unions have said their members could refuse to cross picket lines, potentially disrupting deliveries and other operations at the health system.
The union is seeking to protect workers' health care benefits and seniority protections, along with pay raises and adding Martin Luther King Day and Juneteenth as holidays.
OPEIU Local 12 President Devin Hogan said workers have struggled with low wages: 'It is unacceptable for one of the largest companies in Minnesota to pay such low wages to frontline workers that they have to rely on food banks to feed their families.'
A spokesman for HealthPartners said they are 'committed to staying at the bargaining table to reach a fair and financially responsible agreement with the union' and noted they will meet again next week.
Trump's pick for secretary of labor Lori Chavez DeRemer faces an uncertain path to confirmation in the Senate after appearing not quite anti-union enough to lock in unified Republican support, but not pro-labor enough to win enough Democratic votes to make up the difference.
Chavez DeRemer, a Republican and daughter of a longtime Teamster, hopes to be a bridge connecting the Republican Party's traditional pro-business coalition to its growing base of working-class supporters.
Her nomination brought together strange bedfellows: Teamsters President Sean O'Brien and Oklahoma Sen. Markwayne Mullin. Mullin once challenged O'Brien to a fight in a Senate committee hearing, but the pair united behind Chavez DeRemer. The three appeared in a video together on Wednesday, with Mullin saying they have a good relationship — adding that if he and O'Brien were in a relationship, he would be 'the man.'
During her single term representing Oregon in the House, Chavez DeRemer was a rare Republican co-author on the labor-backed Protecting the Right to Organize Act — PRO Act — which would weaken red states' 'right-to-work' laws, which bar unions from charging fees to non-members who are covered by their collective bargaining agreements. The bill would also add penalties for employers who violate labor law and make it easier for workers to unionize.
But during her Wednesday Senate confirmation hearing, Chavez DeRemer walked back her support for the bill while not fully disavowing it, which did not seem to satisfy ardent supporters or opponents of the bill. Sen. Rand Paul, R-Kentucky, previously said he'll vote against her and predicted more than a dozen other Republicans will join him, though he later said he may reconsider given her disavowal of eliminating right-to-work laws.
Chavez DeRemer also defended Trump's unprecedented firing of National Labor Relations Board member Gwynne Wilcox, whose term was supposed to run through 2028. She is challenging the ousting in a case that tests Trump's executive authority. Her termination has paralyzed the NLRB, which has been a target of his billionaire supporters including Elon Musk and Jeff Bezos.
Trump has appointed more traditional business-side leaders elsewhere in the labor department. He named David Keeling, a former safety executive at UPS and Amazon, to head the Occupational Safety and Health Administration. Amazon, notably, has a sordid safety record and faces citations in Minnesota for allegedly violating the state's new warehouse worker safety law. Keeling did receive support from the Teamsters, which represents UPS drivers and are trying to unionize Amazon employees.
U.S. Rep. Michelle Fischbach introduced a bill to halt a Biden-era rule, which has not yet taken effect, that would set minimum staffing levels at nursing homes.
The bill is symbolic since President Trump's Department of Health and Human Services is unlikely to finalize the rule that the Biden administration argued would improve worker recruitment and retention as well as resident care.
Opponents of the rule said it set unrealistic standards that would have forced nursing homes to shutter, while pointing to a report commissioned by the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services that said there's 'no single staffing level that would guarantee quality care.'
Fischbach's proposal won praise from the Minnesota nursing home lobby.
'In a time when we face ongoing workforce shortages, tying the hands of providers to meet an unattainable standard will not have the intended impact of increasing quality. Rather, it will only jeopardize already-limited access to care for seniors,' said Kari Thurlow, President and CEO of LeadingAge Minnesota, in a statement.
Meanwhile, nurses at North Ridge Health in New Hope and Episcopal Church Homes in St. Paul announced their intention to unionize with SEIU Healthcare Minnesota and Iowa by interrupting manager meetings and calling for better staffing, higher wages and safer working conditions.