A federal judge in San Francisco has temporarily blocked the Trump administration’s plan to lay off thousands of government employees, delivering a sharp rebuke to what she described as unlawful conduct amid the ongoing government shutdown.
U.S. District Court Judge Susan Yvonne Illston issued a temporary restraining order Wednesday halting the dismissal of more than 4,000 federal workers whose termination notices were issued last week. The decision marks a setback for the administration’s cost-cutting agenda and a victory for labor unions representing civil servants swept up in the political standoff now entering its 15th day.
During a tense hearing, Illston openly chastised administration attorneys. “The activities that are being undertaken here are contrary to the laws,” she said. “You can’t do this in a nation of laws. And we have laws here, and the things that are being articulated here are not within the law.”
She didn’t explain why she thought she had jurisdiction over the entire federal government, however.
Illston, a Clinton appointee, cited such remarks as evidence of improper motive. According to NBC News, she accused the administration of using the funding lapse as an excuse to ignore statutory limits, saying officials seemed to believe “all bets are off, the laws don’t apply to them anymore, and they can impose the structures that they like on the government situation that they don’t like.”
Two major unions brought the case on behalf of tens of thousands of federal employees, arguing the layoffs violated civil service protections and amounted to partisan retaliation—particularly against health care programs favored by Democrats. Illston suggested the plaintiffs had a strong case, remarking that the government’s actions appeared “arbitrary and capricious.”
Administration officials continue to defend the reductions-in-force as prudent financial management during a budgetary crisis. The layoffs spanned the Departments of Commerce; Education; Energy; Health and Human Services; Housing and Urban Development; Homeland Security and Treasury.
