By Daniel Wiessner
Jan 28 (Reuters) – Unions representing U.S. government workers have asked a federal judge to block President Donald Trump’s administration from cutting more than 10,000 jobs at the Federal Emergency Management Agency.
The unions in a filing in San Francisco federal court late Tuesday said that job cuts at FEMA, which sends emergency personnel, supplies and equipment to areas stricken by disasters, began last month and that the Trump administration has misled the public about their scope.
According to the filing, FEMA, part of the U.S. Department of Homeland Security, plans not to extend the temporary contracts of thousands of workers and on-call reservists who respond to disasters. About 65 workers were notified on December 31 that their contracts would not be extended and hundreds more will follow each month, the unions said.
The unions claim the cuts are unlawful because they were not approved by Congress and also violate a law passed in November to end a 43-day government shutdown that barred layoffs at federal agencies through January 30.
FEMA and DHS did not immediately respond to requests for comment on Wednesday.
The filing comes as a battle in Congress over funding for DHS threatens to partially shut down the federal government again. Democratic lawmakers have said they will not provide the votes needed to pass the agency’s $64.4 billion budget after the fatal shooting of a second U.S. citizen by federal immigration officers in Minnesota.
Trump, a Republican, has suggested in the past that FEMA should be abolished and that states should be responsible for their emergency preparedness. Trump last year created a council to review the agency’s operations.
The unions are seeking to amend an earlier lawsuit that more broadly challenges mass layoffs by the Trump administration across the federal government.
U.S. District Judge Susan Illston last year blocked large-scale layoffs pending the outcome of the case, but the U.S. Supreme Court lifted her ruling in July. More recently, Illston barred the U.S. State Department from laying off about 250 employees.
Everett Kelley, president of the American Federation of Government Employees, the largest federal worker union, said the administration’s attempts to dismantle FEMA are among the most egregious actions it has taken.
“All Americans rely on the dedicated FEMA workforce, who devote their careers to helping people in their most desperate moments,” Kelley said in a statement.
(Reporting by Daniel Wiessner in Albany, New York, Editing by Alexia Garamfalvi and Aurora Ellis)
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