President Trump has ordered a crackdown on poor performance and misbehavior within the ranks of the federal workforce, senior administration officials said Friday.
Mr. Trump signed a trio of executive orders that reform civil service rules by expediting termination for cause, revamping union contracts and limiting taxpayer-funded union work at agencies, said a senior administration official.
“Today the president is fulfilling his promise to promote more efficient government by reforming civil service rules,” said Andrew P. Bremberg, director of the White House Domestic Policy Council.
He said the president was instituting “merit system principles.”
“These executive order will make it easier for agencies to remove poor-performing employees and make sure taxpayer dollars are more efficiently used,” Mr. Bremberg said.
The changes are bound to meet loud objections from unions.
A senior administration official said the move will promote efficiency and save taxpayer dollars, as well as create a better work environment for “thousands of employees who come to work each day and do a great job.”
Complaints about deadwood in federal agencies are nothing new. And the administration offered statistics to highlight the need for reforms:
• Office of Personnel Management data shows federal employees are 44 times less likely to be fired than a private sector worker once they’ve completed a probationary period....
• A recent Government Accountability Office report showed that it takes between six months and a year to remove a federal employee for poor performance, followed by an eight-month appeals process.