May 28, 2025
At least some fired feds can pursue their case through a class action, administrative judge says.
At least one agency’s staff impacted by the mass dismissals of probationary workers can pursue their reinstatements as a class, the panel that hears federal employees’ challenges to firings has for the first time ruled, creating a new path for sweeping reversals of those terminations.
Hundreds of recently hired and subsequently fired employees at the Homeland Security Department will be part of a class action alleging their dismissals were unlawful after a Merit Systems Protection Board administrative judge granted the request. The DHS ruling was the first to come down after a consortium of lawyers filed similar challenges on behalf of fired probationary employees at 20 federal agencies.
“I find that a class appeal is the fairest and most efficient way to adjudicate the appeal and that the putative class counsel and named appellants will adequately represent the interests of the parties,” said Sara Snyder, the chief administrative judge for MSPB’s western regional office.
DHS fired around 370 employees in February after the Office of Personnel Management instructed agencies across government to begin dismissing their probationary staff, typically those hired or promoted in the previous one or two years. The class does not include employees who were actually fired due to individual performance issues, those not in their probationary period or those who enrolled in the deferred resignation or other separation incentive program.
Read Appeals Board Creates New Path to Renew Reversals of Probationary Firings.