A federal judge on Thursday paused the Trump administration’s deadline for more than 2 million federal employees to decide by the end of the day whether to resign or stay in their jobs in order to allow time for labor unions to challenge the plan's legality.
U.S. District Judge George O'Toole in Boston issued a temporary restraining order and set a hearing for Monday.
The Trump administration’s lawyers had argued that extending the deadline on the very last day would “markedly disrupt the expectations of the federal workforce, inject tremendous uncertainty into a program that scores of federal employees have already availed themselves of, and hinder the administration’s efforts to reform the federal workforce.”
But after the judge issued his order, White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt said the administration was grateful for the extension "so more federal workers who refuse to show up to the office can take the administration up on this very generous, once-in-a-lifetime offer.”
Unions representing many of the nation’s federal workers charge that the new Republican administration’s “unprecedented offer” violates the law.