Judge blocks firing of DEI office intel staffers
By: Bart Jansen
USA today
..... A federal judge on Monday [03/31/2025] blocked the Trump administration from firing 19 staffers at the CIA and Office of the Director of National Intelligence who'd worked on initiatives for diversity, equity and inclusion programs, which President Donald trump had ordered terminated.
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U.S. district Judge Anthony Trenga in eastern Virginia rejected the request for a temporary block on Trump's policy on February 27, [2025] ruling the staffers could ask for reassignment.
..... But the CIA said the staffers had no right of review over their firings.
..... Trenga shifted course Monday, [03/31/2025] deciding the intelligence staffers deserved the opportunity to appeal their firings and to be considered for other jobs.
..... Kevin Carroll, a lawyer representing the staffers and a former CIA caseworker, said ODNI "to there credit" had offered to consider two of the staffers for transfers but the CIA refused.
..... "We're very pleased with the decision," Carroll said. "the judge decided to enjoin CIA and DODNI from firing these DEI folks unless and until they listen to appeals, and then consider them for other jobs inside the intel community."
..... The Justice Department, CIA and ODNI didn't immediately respond to requests for comment on the decision.
..... Government lawyers argued that the law allow is the CIA director to fire an employee when the termination is dimmed necessary or advisable in the interest of the United States. As intelligence staffers, unlike other government employees, these workers have no option to appeal to the Merit Systems Protection Board.
..... "There is no process to appeal this decision within the Agency or otherwise seek reassignment within the Agency," wrote Dennis Barghaan, chief of the civil division in the U.S. Attorney's Office in eastern Virginia.
..... But lawyers for the intelligence workers, who weren't identified by name, said 33 Senate-confirmed directors of central and national intelligence have never terminated a group of officers for any reason other than national security since the CIA was cerated in 1947.
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"It is far more likely that this supposedly dormant power does not lawfully exist," the lawyer wrote. "Defendants' gross overreach risks destroying the Intelligence Community as a nonpartisan entity."
..... Trump aimed to end government DEI programs with an executive order on his first day on the job, January 20. [2025]
..... "The injection of 'diversity, equity, and inclusion' into our institutions has corrupted them by replacing hard work, merit, and equality with a divisive and dangerous preferential hierarchy," one of Trump's order said.
..... His three DEI orders aimed to end preferential treatment in hiring, spending and the military, with decisions based on merit. The order rippled across private companies, too, which have begun changing their DEI programs.
..... but the orders sparked several lawsuits over allegations that the president's order violated the free speech of federal workers and contractors. A federal judge inn Maryland temporarily blocked the order from applying to federal agencies and contractors. Civil rights groups and a teachers union are also fighting the order in separate lawsuits in California and Maryland.