Power Grab/Fire anyone who can stop him
OPM finalized the Schedule Policy/Career rule, making policy-influencing civil servants fireable at will
The rule revives the Schedule F concept Trump ordered in October 2020 and reinstated by executive order on January 20, 2025. It took effect March 9, 2026.
What happened
On February 6, 2026, the Office of Personnel Management published a 78-page final rule creating “Schedule Policy/Career,” effective March 9. It authorizes agency heads to reclassify positions they deem “policy-influencing” out of the competitive service and into the new schedule. OPM says the jobs remain career positions filled without regard to party.
Once moved, the people in those jobs lose the protections that require cause, notice and a right of appeal to the Merit Systems Protection Board before removal. OPM’s stated purpose is to let agencies “quickly remove” employees who perform poorly, commit misconduct, or “obstruct the democratic process by intentionally subverting Presidential directives.”
The rule carries out the executive order Trump signed on January 20, 2025, which restored his October 2020 Schedule F order that President Biden had revoked. Estimates of the positions covered start at about 50,000, and the rule leaves the number to each agency. It requires agencies to write internal policies protecting reclassified employees from prohibited personnel practices. Enforcement of those policies rests with the same agencies.
Who benefited
The president and political appointees gain the ability to dismiss tens of thousands of career officials without the process the civil-service laws require. OMB Director Russell Vought, a long-time architect of Schedule F, benefits, as does OPM leadership, which gained authority over which positions qualify.
Who wanted something
Trump ordered Schedule F in 2020 and again on his first day in 2025. Vought promoted it through Project 2025 and now runs OMB. OPM under Director Scott Kupor wrote the rule. The gain is an at-will workforce in the positions that shape regulations, enforcement and legal advice.
Who lost out
Career civil servants in policy-related roles can now be fired for what a supervisor calls subverting a presidential directive, with no independent appeal. The public relies on scientists, lawyers, inspectors and analysts being able to give unwelcome advice. The merit-system principle, in place since 1883, that most federal jobs are not political, loses ground.
Why it matters
The rule converts the layer of government that turns law into action into an at-will workforce answerable to the president’s directives. The “obstruction” standard is defined by the people doing the firing, and the rule has been in effect since March 9, 2026.
Sources Federal Register (primary)Federal Register API (primary)