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Blue state attorneys general won't let up on Trump [1]
['Daily Kos Staff']
Date: 2025-03-07
Since President Donald Trump was sworn in, blue state attorneys general have banded together to oppose the White House’s many unlawful actions. Their latest push: defending fired federal employees.
A coalition of 20 attorneys general filed a lawsuit Thursday against numerous federal agencies for conducting mass layoffs of federal probationary employees without giving the lawfully required 60-day notice to state governments. They are asking a Maryland court to reinstate unlawfully fired employees, stop further similar terminations, and identify impacted employees.
“These large-scale, indiscriminate firings are not only subjecting the plaintiff states and communities across the country to chaos. They are also against the law,” the complaint states.
Democratic attorneys general, the Democratic Party, and labor unions are tying the White House up in the courts with lawsuits—and they have already scored two victories against a draconian federal funding freeze and an unconstitutional birthright citizenship ban.
The latest lawsuit is in reaction to thousands of federal employees being fired, including those who served our country and their relatives. The firings have been so sweeping that they have reportedly overwhelmed the unemployment benefits system. Workers have faced degrading demands from co-President Elon Musk at the risk of losing their jobs, or had to deal with MAGA relatives celebrating their career demise.
After Musk’s so-called Department of Government Efficiency instituted indiscriminate layoffs across federal agencies including the Federal Aviation Administration and the Department of Health and Human Services, the U.S. experienced commercial plane crashes and a surge in measles. The White House responded by having agency supervisors beg fired employees to come back.
Democratic lawmakers have also resisted the DOGE-directed firings, introducing legislation that reinstates fired veterans. Some Democrats invited laid-off employees as their guests during Trump’s joint address to Congress on Tuesday to highlight their plights.
“[T]he Trump Administration has harmed thousands of employees and families themselves, including many veterans in our state who have dutifully served their country in uniform,” said New Jersey Attorney General Matthew Platkin. "These firings have also damaged collaboration between our state and federal government and caused significant expenses to New Jersey.”
“This abrupt, senseless hemorrhaging of federal workers has inflicted immense harms on thousands of American workers, the families that depend upon them, and the states in which they reside,” said Michigan Attorney General Dana Nessel in a YouTube video.
The mass firings are impacting more than just the workers: States are also having to pick up the slack.
According to a press release from Rhode Island Attorney General Peter Neronha, the mass purge is causing “irreparable burdens and expenses on the part of the states” which have to support recently fired workers with unemployment benefits and review and adjudicate their claims.
“[T]hese mass layoffs require adequate notice to the states, and without appropriate notice, states cannot prepare to properly serve affected workers,” said Neronha. “If the President wants to reduce the size of the federal government, he must do so through legal means.”
In addition to New Jersey, Rhode Island and Michigan, attorneys general from Arizona, California, Colorado, Connecticut, Delaware, the District of Columbia, Hawaii, Illinois, Maryland, Massachusetts, Minnesota, Nevada, New Mexico, New York, Oregon, Vermont, and Wisconsin also joined in Friday’s lawsuit.
While the Trump administration won’t reveal the exact number of employees fired so far, the Associated Press reports that the number is in the hundreds of thousands.
And although the exact number of lawsuits filed against Trump’s White House isn’t known, The New York Times’ analysis shows that there have been dozens—with at least 41 rulings temporarily pausing some of the president’s actions.
Trump calls himself a king. But we know we are not a nation of kings—and we never will be. Get your Daily Kos T-shirt or hat to spread the message and wear it with pride: No Kings.
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