Project 2025 and Schedule F have been in our research queue relative to our prognostication in the  OODA Almanac 2024: “Viewed through the lens of history, 2024 will be a landmark year punctuated by the complexities of a political process that will exacerbate the binary fractures of the American republic.”  As we head into the national conventions of the U.S. political parties, find what you need to know about Schedule F here.

Schedule F Executive Order 13957 (Issued October 2020; Rescinded January 2021)

The Schedule F Executive Order, issued by the Trump Administration on October 21, 2020, aimed to create a new category of federal employees called Schedule F. This category would include federal employees in positions of a confidential, policy-determining, policy-making, or policy-advocating character, who were previously part of the competitive service.

Key points of the Executive Order:

1. Reclassification of Positions: It directed federal agencies to review their positions and reclassify those involved in policy-related work to Schedule F, removing them from the competitive service.
2. Exempt from Competitive Service Rules: Employees in Schedule F would be exempt from certain rules and protections of the competitive service, such as those related to hiring and firing, effectively making it easier to hire and remove them.
3. Implementation Timeline: Agencies were given 90 days to identify and reclassify the relevant positions.
4. Impact on Job Protections: The reclassification aimed to reduce job protections for these employees, making it easier to dismiss those in policy-making roles.
5. Rationale: The stated goal was to improve accountability and efficiency within the federal workforce by allowing more flexibility in hiring and firing policy-related positions.

The order was highly controversial. Critics argued that it could politicize the civil service by allowing the replacement of career officials with political appointees. The Biden Administration later rescinded the order.

What Next?

How Trump could reimpose “Schedule F” in 2025

As summarized by Axios:

Axios’ Jonathan Swan reports that sources close to former President Trump say he would immediately reimpose his “Schedule F” executive order if he takes back the White House in the 2024 presidential elections.

Why it matters: Swan reports that it would effectively upend the modern civil service and put future presidents in the position of bringing in their own loyalists or reverting to a traditional bureaucracy.

The backstory on Schedule F:  Trump signed an executive order in October 2020 that established a new Schedule F employment category for federal employees.

• It was rescinded by President Biden shortly after he took office in 2021.
• But back in March of 2022, Trump floated the possibility of going after the federal workforce.
• “We will pass critical reforms making every executive branch employee fireable by the president of the United States,” he said at a rally in South Carolina. “The deep state must and will be brought to heel.”

Who would be reassigned as Schedule F:  Tens of thousands of civil servants who serve in roles deemed to have some influence over policy would be reassigned as “Schedule F” employees.

Those levels of influence included “confidential, policy-determining, policy-making or policy-advocating,” the order says.

What it means to be given a Schedule F assignment:  Gov Exec reports that upon re-assignment, they would lose their employment protections, making them functionally at-will employees and, therefore, far easier to fire.

How many people would Schedule F affect?:  Swan reports that it could apply to as many as 50,000 federal workers out of a workforce of more than 2 million.

How is this different from regular presidential appointees?:  New presidents typically get to replace more than 4,000 so-called “political” appointees to oversee the running of their administrations.

But below this rotating layer of political appointees sits a mass of government workers who enjoy strong employment protections and typically continue their service from one administration to the next regardless of the president’s party affiliation.

Go deeper: A radical plan for Trump’s second term

Office of Personnel Management (OPM) issues its final rule for Schedule F protections

“The federal HR agency finalized its rule offering protections for career civil servants meant to safeguard against the potential reemergence of the Trump-era Schedule F policy.”

The Office of Personnel Management issued the final version of its regulation meant to safeguard the civil service from the return of a Trump-era policy that sought to convert most federal employees to at-will workers. The new regulation — [which was published in the Federal Register for public inspection on April — seeks to provide 2.2 million federal employees with defined protections that would make it difficult for a future administration to re-apply the Trump policy, known as Schedule F.

OPM officials began working on new regulations to make it difficult to reintroduce Schedule F policies in September 2023, receiving more than 4,000 public comments.

The final rule states that an employee’s civil service protections cannot be taken away by an involuntary move from the competitive service to the excepted service; clarifies that the “employees in confidential, policy-determining, policy-making or policy-advocating positions” terminology used to define Schedule F employees means noncareer, political appointments and won’t be applied to career civil servants; and sets up an appeals process with the Merit Systems Protection Board for any employees involuntarily transferred from the competitive service to the excepted service and within the excepted service.

The move comes in an election year where Trump is seeking a return to the White House, and GOP allies, and rivals, have sought to revive the policy if elected.

Biden administration officials said that the regulation is the strongest protection the White House can provide to safeguard against Schedule F, though there have been similar GOP efforts on Capitol Hill last year to codify elements of the policy.  A senior administration official said the White House would welcome legislation to further strengthen civil service protections, but that the new regulation was “firmly in line” with existing policies in the current law.  The final rule was largely well-received among stakeholders and groups advocating for good governance.  The regulation…[went]…into effect on May 9.

United States Government Accountability Office: Report to Congressional Requesters –
CIVIL SERVICE:  Agency Responses and Perspectives on Former Executive Order to Create a New Schedule F Category of Federal Positions

The Government Accountability Office (GAO) report on Schedule F provides an overview of the implementation and implications of Executive Order 13957, which was issued by the Trump Administration in October 2020.  Overall, the GAO report provides a detailed analysis of the implications of Schedule F, reflecting a range of stakeholder views on its potential impact on the federal workforce.

The key findings and perspectives from the GAO report include:

1. Implementation Status:
   • No federal agency had placed positions into Schedule F before the executive order was revoked in January 2021. However, two agencies, the Office of Management and Budget (OMB) and the U.S. International Boundary and Water Commission, submitted requests to the Office of Personnel Management (OPM) to place positions into Schedule F. OMB’s request was approved for 136 positions, affecting 415 employees (about 68% of its workforce)​ (US GAO)​​ (FEDweek)​.
2. Stakeholder Perspectives:
   • Hiring and Retention: Some stakeholders noted that Schedule F could streamline the hiring process and allow for the faster appointment of individuals aligned with the President’s policy agenda. However, concerns were raised that this could lead to hiring based on political loyalty rather than qualifications, potentially deterring qualified candidates from seeking federal employment due to fears of political removal​ (US GAO)​​ (FEDweek)​.
   • Employee Accountability: The expedited removal process under Schedule F was intended to enhance performance accountability by making it easier to dismiss poorly performing employees. However, stakeholders expressed concerns that reduced due process protections could lead to removals based on partisan reasons, undermining the independence and effectiveness of the civil service​ (FEDweek)​.
3. Trade-offs and Risks:
   • The GAO highlighted potential trade-offs, including the risk of increased political influence over the civil service, loss of institutional knowledge, and challenges in maintaining a nonpartisan federal workforce. The report suggested that while Schedule F could facilitate policy implementation, it could also result in higher employee turnover and reduced morale​ (FEDweek)​.
4. Future Considerations:
   • The GAO report noted that future administrations might consider re-establishing Schedule F or a similar category to achieve greater control over policy-related positions. However, agencies would need to carefully weigh the potential benefits against the risks of politicization and impacts on recruitment and retention​ (US GAO)​.

Additional OODA Loop Resources

OODA Almanac 2024 – Reorientation

Civil War Cinema  Viewed through the lens of history, 2024 will be a landmark year punctuated by the complexities of a political process that will exacerbate the binary fractures of the American republic. These issues are much to deep to benefit from analysis here, but it is always important to contemplate how close to the flame we are dancing in the context of an Eric Hoffer case study. It is also a year that will be marked by a major cinema film that contemplates a new American Civil War, normalizing the idea of conflict to resolve political differences and it hits at a time of misaligned governance incentives and high levels of poverty and displacement.

Focused on the thematics of this Almanac, we should acknowledge that problems arise when societies dream more about how things were than how they could be and that a vote is the last bastion of power you have against a broken and corrupt system without firing bullets. Therefore, the articulation of the future and the benefits of exponential technologies need to align with the first principles of democracy and opportunity.