A federal judge in Massachusetts paused the Trump administration’s federal employee buyout offer ahead of its deadline Thursday, as the White House said tens of thousands of employees had taken the offer.
The pause, until at least Monday, came as part of a lawsuit brought by the American Federation of Government Employees and other employee unions, who argued the buyout offer violated federal law. At a brief hearing Thursday, District Judge George A. O’Toole Jr. for the District of Massachusetts ordered the program, referred to as the “Fork Directive,” paused so he can have “proper consideration” of the issues raised by the unions and the Trump administration.
O’Toole cautioned that he was not ruling in favor of the plaintiffs during the hearing.
“I make no assessment at this stage of the merits of the claims,” O’Toole said.
The offer, titled “Fork in the Road,” sent to federal employees last week, would allow federal workers to make a “deferred resignation” until Sept. 30. The offer said workers would retain their pay and benefits and be exempt from in-office requirements until the date of their resignation.
The offer was made as part of Elon Musk’s push to reduce the federal workforce via his so-called Department of Government Efficiency.
The email gave employees until Thursday to decide whether to take the offer. White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt told reporters Thursday that more than 40,000 employees had accepted buyout offers. “We expect it to increase,” she said.
In their complaint, the employee unions argued the buyout offer violated federal law and lacked basic information, including whether the Office of Personnel Management “can (or will) honor the financial commitment for agencies across government when Congress has appropriated no funds for this purpose, and the statutory basis and appropriation for this promise remain unclear.”
The complaint further said the federal government wasn’t in a position to make the guarantee, as federal funding runs out in March. Federal law prohibits the government from making a promise to pay such a buyout without a congressional appropriation, the complaint said.
A dozen state attorneys general, led by New York Attorney General Letitia James, on Monday warned federal workers that the buyout offers may be misleading, and an effort to attack the federal workforce as a whole.
“These supposed offers are not guaranteed. Federal employees should be cautious and follow the guidance of their unions to protect their rights,” James said in a statement.
In a court filing ahead of Thursday’s hearing, the Justice Department argued against any delay. The DOJ said delaying the deadline would create confusion throughout the federal government, while not addressing the harms raised by the plaintiffs.
“Extending that deadline on the expiration date would not just engender confusion and upset expectations, but perhaps more importantly, would disrupt a critical priority of the Executive Branch to reform the federal workforce,” the filing said.
The ruling came the same day that a federal judge in Washington denied a motion from a group of anonymous federal employees seeking to pause the OPM’s use of a server created to send the buyout emails to every federal employee.
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