Judges Have Ordered Federal Workers Back on the Job. Now What?

Last month, thousands of employees with probationary status across the federal government were fired by the Trump administration in an extraordinary and coordinated move. On Thursday, a pair of court rulings called for agencies to reinstate a untold number of them.

What happens now isn’t so clear cut.

Agencies are sorting out how to bring back these employees and give them the back pay ordered by the courts. Some of the fired workers may indeed return to their jobs. Others may be placed on administrative leave until their agencies undergo a round of large-scale layoffs, the planning for which is already underway.

The mass firings of probationary workers were just one early phase of President Trump’s aggressive plan to shrink the federal government. His administration appeared to target probationary employees because they do not have the same civil service protections as employees who have been in their job longer. But a flurry of challenges to the legality of how Trump officials went about ordering up the personnel changes have resulted in some reprieves, at least temporarily or on paper.

In interviews and on social media, fired employees expressed excitement about being reinstated and getting paid for the days since they were fired. Still, many employees are in the dark, learning details about their livelihood through media reports.

Here is what we know about the reinstatements, and what we don’t.

What did the judges order?

The rulings, in federal courts in California and Maryland, call for a pause in the firings and reinstatement of probationary employees across 19 agencies. The cases themselves will continue to move forward, with the government planning to appeal.

But the plaintiffs’ goals were to at least temporarily stop the administration from firing more probationary workers and obtain relief, such as back pay, for the employees already out of work.

The judges ruled that the firings were carried out unlawfully in accordance with orders from the Office of Personnel Management, the government’s human resources office. Only the agencies themselves have the authority to direct those personnel changes, one of the judges wrote.

Judge James Bredar of the U.S. District Court for the District of Maryland restricted the government from firing any more probationary workers for two weeks. Judge Bredar said the employees covered in the lawsuit, who are from 18 different agencies, must be reinstated by March 17.

Judge William H. Alsup of the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of California, ordered the government to pause firings and reinstate probationary employees at six agencies while the case continues. His order applied to the Pentagon, the Treasury, and the departments of Agriculture, Energy, Veterans Affairs, and the Interior.

Lawyers representing those groups estimated at least 10,000 people were affected across those agencies, numbers more or less consistent with data collected by The Times.

The judge’s orders follow a similar decision handed down by the Merit Systems Protection Board, an independent administrative body that reviews government personnel decisions. It ordered on March 5 that certain probationary employees, mostly from the Department of Agriculture, be reinstated for at least 45 days.

What have the fired employees heard?

It depends on who you ask. There does not appear to be a uniform way that agencies are going about reinstating fired probationary employees.

Tim Kauffman, a spokesman for the American Federation of Government Workers, which is involved in one of the cases, said the union does not know how many of its members will be offered their jobs back. Mr. Kauffman said agencies had denied union requests for the number of fired probationary employees.

The union representing workers for the Internal Revenue Service sent an email to probationary employees who were fired, informing them that they were in the process of speaking with agency management about the next steps. In the email, shared with The New York Times, the National Treasury Employees Union said employees with one agency — the Energy Department — have started receiving reinstatement notifications after the court orders on Thursday.

“We are pressing other agencies to issue reinstatement notices as quickly as possible,” the email stated. The Energy Department did not respond to a request for comment.

Some employees from the National Institutes of Health were notified of their reinstatement through an email Thursday from the agency’s human resources division.

“Upon further review, the agency has determined to rescind the letter sent to you on 2/15/2025,” the email stated, adding that the National Institutes of Health will work with them on a return to their jobs. The agency did not respond to a request for comment.

Some fired probationary employees from the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau have heard from the agency’s human resources division that reinstatements are underway, according to Cat Farman, the president of the local chapter of the employee union. The agency did not respond to a request for comment.

Other fired employees, however, are still getting “off-boarding” messages from the agency, Ms. Farman said, such as reminders to turn in their government-issued equipment.

Does this mean employees will immediately be back at work?

Not necessarily.

The Department of Agriculture, for example, said in a statement this week that it had returned all its fired probationary workers to “pay status” as of Wednesday. The statement did not say how many, or if any, workers would be returning to their jobs.

“The department will work quickly to develop a phased plan for return to duty, and while those plans materialize, all probationary employees will be paid,” the statement said.

But it was not clear that similar information was communicated to all of the fired employees at the agency. The agency did not respond to a request for comment.

“I’m getting really frustrated,” said Jacob Bushno, one of the probationary employees fired. He said he has not received any communications from the agency, and that he had reached out to his human resources department and his managers.

“Zero. No guidance,” he said on Friday. Mr. Bushno, a veteran who did two tours in Iraq while he was in the Army’s air assault division, was fired just seven days before he completed his one-year probationary period at the Forest Service.

“When will we get paid/back pay? Do we get to come back to the office?” he asked.

A probationary employee who was fired from Housing and Urban Development last month similarly has not heard from the agency. The employee spoke on condition of anonymity out of fear of retribution. The housing agency did not respond to a request for comment. Ashaki Robinson, a representative for the union that represents workers at the agency, said the union has not heard of any fired employees hearing from the agency as of late Friday afternoon.

Can the Trump administration still move forward with other layoffs?

Yes.

The judge’s rulings do not protect anyone from mass firings through other methods in the future. As the rulings came down on Thursday, federal agencies were finalizing plans to cut an even larger swath of the federal work force.

In the Maryland case, the judge told the government that it couldn’t carry out future mass firings without prior notice as required by law.

In the case in California, the judge made plain that agencies planning to conduct large-scale layoffs, known as a “reduction in force,” can still proceed in accordance with the laws that govern such processes — meaning that the reprieves for workers may only be temporary.

Apoorva Mandavilli contributed reporting.