The appeals court’s majority said the union had failed to show it would suffer the type of irreparable harm that would justify the preliminary injunction.
A federal appeals court on May 17 allowed the Trump administration to go through with its plan to strip collective bargaining by workers at more than a dozen federal agencies.
In a 2–1 ruling, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit sided with the Trump administration on arguments that its directive is warranted on national security grounds, overturning a lower court judge’s ruling to block the administration.
That injunction, issued by U.S. District Judge Paul Friedman, froze the administration’s executive order targeting collective bargaining after siding with National Treasury Employees Union, which filed the lawsuit.
The order, issued by President Donald Trump in late March, placed exemptions on more than a dozen federal agencies from any obligation to bargain with unions. Those agencies include the departments of Justice, State, Defense, Treasury, Veterans Affairs, and Health and Human Services.
A fact sheet released by the White House on the order stated that those agencies have “national security missions” that could be obstructed by “hostile federal unions to obstruct agency management.”
The order also allows the administration to “ensure that agencies vital to national security can execute their missions without delay and protect the American people” and that the executive branch requires “a responsive and accountable civil service to protect our national security.”
In response, the Treasury union, which represents about 160,000 federal employees, argued that the executive order violates federal workers’ labor rights and the Constitution. It also argued that Trump issued the order to retaliate against the union because of its efforts to stop his actions to reshape and downsize the federal government.
The appeals court’s majority said the union had failed to show it would suffer the type of irreparable harm that would justify the preliminary injunction issued by Friedman on April 25.
U.S. Circuit Judges Karen Henderson and Justin Walker wrote that the lower court judge’s injunction, if they allowed it to remain in effect, would impede Trump’s national security prerogatives.
