WASHINGTON D.C. - Democracy Defenders Fund and a group of prominent First Amendment scholars and experts submitted a public comment in opposition to the Trump administration’s proposed rule, “Improving Performance, Accountability and Responsiveness in the Civil Service.” The proposed rule, which appears aimed at facilitating mass firings based on employees’ political beliefs and associations, would violate well-established First Amendment rights.

“Since day one, President Trump, Vice President Vance and the White House personnel office have repeatedly stated their intent to target federal employees with political purges,” said Amb. Norm Eisen, executive chair at Democracy Defenders Fund. “Nonpartisan career civil servants are the backbone of our government. This rule tramples over their First Amendment rights in an attempt to fill the government with sycophants and loyalists.”

In the comment, the group argues the proposed rule threatens the freedoms of speech and association, which are core tenets of the First Amendment, by facilitating political purges of the federal workforce.

“OPM’s proposed rule threatens the core First Amendment rights of federal employees by enabling a political purge of civil servants, ” said Amanda Shanor, a signer and First Amendment expert at the University of Pennsylvania. “The sweeping discretion the rule gives agencies to reclassify and then fire employees for their political speech or association will chill the federal workforce’s First Amendment freedoms. The proposed rule would allow the government to unconstitutionally condition federal employment on political belief, undermining not only the integrity of our civil service but all of our constitutional freedoms.”

The experts who signed the comment to the Office of Personnel Management are listed below.*

Norman Eisen

Executive Chair

Democracy Defenders Fund

Floyd Abrams

Abrams Institute for Freedom of Expression

Yale Law School

Author, The Soul of the First Amendment (Yale U. Press, 2018)

Erwin Chemerinsky

Dean and Jesse H. Choper Distinguished Professor of Law

University of California, Berkeley, School of Law

Pamela S. Karlan

Kenneth and Harle Montgomery Professor of Public Interest Law

Stanford Law School

Seth F. Kreimer

Kenneth W. Gemmill Professor of Law

University of Pennsylvania Carey Law School

Genevieve Lakier

Professor of Law and Herbert & Marjorie Fried Teaching Scholar

The University of Chicago Law School

Amanda Shanor

Assistant Professor of Legal Studies & Business Ethics

The Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania

Kate Shaw

Professor of Law

University of Pennsylvania Carey Law School

Geoffrey R. Stone

Edward H. Levi Distinguished Service Professor of Law

The University of Chicago Law School

Rebecca Tushnet

Frank Stanton Professor of the First Amendment

Harvard Law School

Laura Weinrib

Fred N. Fishman Professor of Constitutional Law

Harvard Law School

The full letter can be found here

*Individuals are listed in their personal capacity. Affiliation is provided for informational purposes only.

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Democracy Defenders Fund brings together a nonpartisan team to work with national, state, and local allies across the country to defend in real-time the foundations of our democracy.