With just weeks remaining in President Joe Biden's administration, top officials are working on measures critics are calling attempts to ‘Trump-proof’ the government. However, Republican legislators and politicians are fighting these actions, saying they threaten the incoming administration’s legitimacy.
Republican lawmakers, including House Oversight Committee Chair James Comer and incoming DOGE Subcommittee Chair Marjorie Taylor Greene, are demanding that federal agencies halt union negotiations and provide records related to these agreements, per Daily Mail.
“We strongly urge the Biden-Harris Administration to cease negotiating or extending collective bargaining agreements with respect to a workforce it will have no responsibility to manage going forward,” Comer and Greene wrote in a letter sent to 24 executive agency chiefs.
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Biden's hand-picked agency chiefs have recently negotiated long-term agreements with federal unions that could restrict President-elect Donald Trump’s ability to implement his agenda.
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Among the most controversial is a deal approved by Social Security Administration (SSA) chief Martin O'Malley with the American Federation of Government Employees (AFGE), one of the largest federal worker unions. The agreement, signed shortly before O'Malley's departure, locks in remote work policies for 42,000 SSA employees—approximately 70% of its workforce—until 2029. This directly counters Trump’s stated goal of bringing federal employees back to their offices, an objective shared by Elon Musk and Vivek Ramaswamy, co-leaders of the Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE).
{{/usCountry}}Among the most controversial is a deal approved by Social Security Administration (SSA) chief Martin O'Malley with the American Federation of Government Employees (AFGE), one of the largest federal worker unions. The agreement, signed shortly before O'Malley's departure, locks in remote work policies for 42,000 SSA employees—approximately 70% of its workforce—until 2029. This directly counters Trump’s stated goal of bringing federal employees back to their offices, an objective shared by Elon Musk and Vivek Ramaswamy, co-leaders of the Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE).
{{/usCountry}}Comer and Greene's letter accuses Biden officials of using union deals to preserve policies from the current administration, claiming they are “primarily designed to protect the outgoing Administration’s policies from being overturned.” It also criticizes the agreements for ceding executive authority to unelected federal employees and their unions. “Requiring an incoming President to bargain with federal employee unions for the right to implement his policies is a ceding of executive power,” the letter states.
Similar measures have been implemented at other agencies. For instance, the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) reached a deal with AFGE in May, which includes protections for “scientific integrity” and whistleblowers. Republicans argue this agreement is designed to “entrench far-left progressive policies” and discredit dissenting views.
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Musk and Ramaswamy, tasked with streamlining government operations, wrote in a Wall Street Journal op-ed, “Requiring federal employees to come to the office five days a week would result in a wave of voluntary terminations that we welcome.” They’ve also suggested eliminating daylight savings and floated the idea of a “naughty or nice” congressional spending tracker.