A judge on Thursday blocked the US State Department from immediately laying off more than 250 workers, a legal setback for President Donald Trump and his mass firings of government employees. US District Judge Susan Illston in San Francisco said employee unions that filed the lawsuit were likely to prevail on their claim that the planned cuts, which include civil service and US Foreign Service positions, are not allowed under a law Congress passed last month to end a 43-day government shutdown.
The layoffs were set to take effect Friday. Illston’s order is temporary and does not address the merits of the case. The law, known as a continuing resolution, prohibits agencies from implementing layoffs through January 30. The Trump administration has told agencies that the law does not apply to job cuts that had been announced before the shutdown began on October 1, including more than 1,300 State Department layoffs that were first announced in July. Hundreds of those workers were terminated in September, before the shutdown.
The American Federation of Government Employees and American Foreign Service Association said in Wednesday’s filing that the administration’s interpretation of the law is wrong. They asked Illston to issue a ruling by Friday morning blocking the layoffs, pending further litigation.
Morale within the Foreign Service, the US diplomatic corps, is tanking. A recent survey conducted by the American Foreign Service Association showed 98 percent of the 2,000 respondents reported poor morale while 86 percent said changes in the workplace since Trump took office in January have undermined their ability to implement foreign policy. Only 1 percent reported improvement.
The State Department did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
The filing was made in a lawsuit the unions brought in October to block several federal agencies including the State Department from laying off more than 4,000 employees during the government shutdown. Illston sided with the unions, ruling that implementing layoffs was not an essential government service that can continue during a shutdown. In May, Illston in a separate case brought by federal worker unions temporarily blocked the government from laying off thousands of employees, a key piece of Trump’s plan to shrink and reorganize US agencies.
The US Supreme Court paused that ruling in July, but the administration scaled back planned layoffs after tens of thousands of employees accepted buyouts or retired early.
US judge blocks 250 State Department layoffs for now
https://arab.news/gdpnw
US judge blocks 250 State Department layoffs for now
- Order is temporary, says unions who filed lawsuit are likely to prevail
- Unions say job cuts prohibited by law Congress passed last month
US ‘totally stupid’ to attack Iran during talks: UN ambassador
- “War was not our option. War was imposed on Iran,” Bahreini told UN correspondents
- “Nobody should expect Iran to show restraint in front of aggression”
GENEVA: The United States made a “totally stupid decision” to attack Iran while in negotiations, and betrayed Gulf nations by trashing their diplomatic efforts, Tehran’s UN ambassador said Tuesday.
Ali Bahreini, Iran’s ambassador in Geneva, insisted Tehran had no problem with its neighbors, but could not let US bases in the Gulf be used as launchpads for attacks on Iran.
“War was not our option. War was imposed on Iran,” Bahreini told UN correspondents.
“Nobody should expect Iran to show restraint in front of aggression.
“We will continue our defense until the point that this aggression is stopped,” he said.
On February 26, Washington and Tehran held indirect negotiations in Geneva on Iran’s nuclear program — with the Omani mediators reporting “significant progress.”
Bahreini was present for part of those talks and said “everybody was optimistic” and the US team “agreed to continue negotiations” in Vienna this week.
But Bahreini said Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu had convinced US President Donald Trump to destroy diplomacy and attack Iran, with strikes starting on Saturday.
“It was a totally stupid decision. They will know in the future how stupid this decision has been. Both of them will understand, because Iran will firmly determine the situation and the destiny of this war,” he said.
“All our neighbors are now disappointed with the betrayal of the United States because everybody was working for diplomacy, particularly Oman.
“The US betrayed everybody.”
- ‘Not a regional war’ -
Tehran has launched strikes against countries in the region that host US bases.
“I cannot accept labelling what we are doing as reprisal. What we are doing is a kind of self-defense,” said Bahreini.
The ambassador said Iran’s problem was not with its neighbors, describing the Gulf countries as friends.
“We are in daily dialogue with our neighbors to convey to them the message that this war is not a war against our neighbors.
“This is not a regional war.
“But we cannot ignore the fact that the US bases in their lands are operational against us.
“In no way we can allow those bases to be used to make military operations against Iran.”
He said Iran’s operations were “exclusively” against US military targets, and said “there has been very serious order given to our military forces not to make any harm to civilians.”
Trump claimed Tuesday that the Iranian leadership “want to talk” but Bahreini insisted no approach had been made to Washington, saying “there hasn’t been any contact from our side” since the war erupted.
