‘Must serve the pleasure of President': Trump administration to prioritise ‘patriotic Americans' for federal jobs

Indian Express

31-05-2025

As part of a broader push to shrink the federal workforce, the Trump administration has unveiled a new hiring strategy aimed at ensuring that new government employees are 'patriotic Americans' committed to advancing the president's agenda, Politico reported.
Outlined in a memo released Thursday by the White House and the Office of Personnel Management (OPM), the new directives mark a sharp departure from traditional federal hiring practices. The 'merit hiring plan,' as it's called, was the result of an executive order issued on Trump's first day in office to overhaul the federal recruitment system.
According to Politico, the plan stipulates that only 'the most talented, capable and patriotic Americans' should be hired. It includes new essay requirements for job applicants at the GS-5 pay grade and above. Candidates must explain how they would uphold the Constitution, improve government efficiency, advance Trump's executive orders, and demonstrate work ethic.
'The overly complex Federal hiring system overemphasized discriminatory 'equity' quotas and too often resulted in the hiring of unfit, unskilled bureaucrats,' the memo states, as reported by Politico. It was authored by Vince Haley, assistant to the president for domestic policy, and Charles Ezell, acting director of OPM.
The administration, long critical of career civil servants, has accused some of working against Trump's policy goals. To address this, the memo says applicants will be required to show personal commitment to the president's priorities. It also takes aim at current recruitment channels, saying they lean too heavily on 'elite universities and credentials.'
As reported by Politico, the hiring effort will now focus on recruits from 'state and land-grant universities, religious colleges and universities, community colleges, high schools, trade and technical schools, homeschooling groups, faith-based groups, American Legion, 4-H youth programs, and the military, veterans, and law enforcement communities.'
The plan also bars agencies from considering race, sex, or national origin in hiring or promotion decisions, and directs them to stop using demographic data or underrepresentation metrics. Agencies are instructed to 'cease using statistics on race, sex, ethnicity or national origin, or the broader concept of 'underrepresentation' of certain groups,' according to the memo seen by Politico.
To accelerate hiring, the administration is pushing to reduce the overall time to hire to under 80 days across federal departments.
Additionally, a second memo targets reforms within the Senior Executive Service (SES), the top tier of career federal employees. Trump, who has long insisted that SES officials 'must serve at the pleasure of the President,' is seeking to overhaul how senior leaders are selected and developed.
That memo criticises the current SES hiring process as 'broken' and 'insular,' claiming it has produced executives who 'engage in unauthorized disclosure of Executive Branch deliberations, violate the constitutional rights of Americans, refuse to implement policy priorities, or perform their duties inefficiently or negligently.'
According to Politico, the administration is also scrapping 'unlawful 'diversity, equity and inclusion' (DEI) criteria' from SES hiring. Future selections will be based on merit, competence, and alignment with executive priorities.
To support this shift, OPM will launch an '80-hour intensive fee-based aspiring executive development program,' designed to train future senior leaders in line with Trump's vision. The program will be 'grounded in the Constitution, laws, and Founding ideals of our government, and will provide training on President Trump's Executive Orders,' the memo states.
As reported by Politico, the training will equip future federal executives with 'the skills, knowledge, technical expertise, and strategic mindset necessary to excel in senior leadership roles.'