A federal judge in Boston on Wednesday dissolved his temporary freeze on the Trump administration’s unprecedented offer for millions of federal workers to resign, allowing the controversial “fork in the road” program to proceed.
U.S. District Judge George A. O’Toole Jr. had temporarily halted the administration’s offer of mass buyouts to millions of federal workers last week, just hours before the Thursday deadline for employees to accept it. That order came after labor unions representing government workers filed suit alleging that the administration did not have the legal authority to offer such buyouts.
In his ruling Wednesday, O’Toole found that the unions lacked legal standing to bring the suit.
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“The plaintiffs here are not directly impacted by the directive. Instead, they allege that the directive subjects them to upstream effects including a diversion of resources to answer members’ questions about the directive, a potential loss of membership, and possible reputational harm,” he wrote.
“The unions do not have the required direct stake in the Fork Directive, but are challenging a policy that affects others, specifically executive branch employees. This is not sufficient,” O’Toole added.
He said the “temporary restraining order previously entered is DISSOLVED and further preliminary injunctive relief is DENIED.”
White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt praised the judge’s action.
“This Boston Buyout Ruling is the first of many legal wins for the President,” she said in a statement. “This goes to show that lawfare will not ultimately prevail over the will of 77 million Americans who supported President Trump and his priorities.”
Everett Kelley, the head of the one of the unions involved in the suit, the American Federation of Government Employees, called the ruling “a setback in the fight for dignity and fairness for public servants. But it’s not the end of that fight. AFGE’s lawyers are evaluating the decision and assessing next steps.”
He also noted the ruling “did not address the underlying lawfulness of the program.”
Skye Perryman, president and CEO of Democracy Forward and counsel for the plaintiffs, said in a statement, “We will continue to pursue all legal options to defend the civil service and protect the American people from extremism.”
The Office of Personnel Management extended the mass “deferred resignation” offer to employees in a Jan. 28 email with the subject line “Fork in the Road.” The program says it will allow workers to resign now but get paid through September.
Some legal experts have questioned the validity of the offer. Education Department staffers were warned last week that the administration could theoretically decide to cancel the plan and leave them high and dry.
A senior administration official told NBC News at the time the offer was first made that 5% to 10% of the federal workforce were expected to quit. The official estimated that could lead to $100 billion in savings.
When O’Toole froze the program last week, 60,000 workers had accepted the deal.
While most full-time federal employees are eligible for the offer, there were exceptions for members of the military, employees of the U.S. Postal Service, people in positions related to immigration enforcement and national security and people in other jobs excluded by agencies.
