Posted on July 29, 2026 by AdminUN

NTEU GETS HUGE WIN FOR HHS PROBATIONERS

Early in his 2025 revenge tour against the federal civil service, Trump demanded that agencies purge as many probationers as they could.  Normally, he and any other President has the power to do that—if they do it according to the rules. But as our dear leader has shown repeatedly throughout his life, he feels rules are for other people. So, when the president’s toadies carried out his orders without any protest, it resulted in about 3,200 HHS employees losing their jobs instantly.  But rules are rules and if any union is good at enforcing them it is NTEU.  It not only alleged that the mass terminations allegedly for performance was an illegal attempt to avoid the due process RIF procedures of the contract and regulations, but also claimed implementing the terminations without bargaining violated federal law. And damned if it did not win at arbitration creating the potential for the arbitrator to order the retroactive reinstatement of the 3,200 along with any back pay, interest, and benefits they missed out on.  Continue reading →

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Posted on July 23, 2026 by AdminUN

GRIEVANCE DRAFTING TIPS 1, 2 & 3

Most contracts merely require the union to put the following in the grievance: 1- Article and section violated, 2- Description of the grieved event, and 3- Remedy desired.   As clear as that or similar language appears, there are some drafting tips that will boost your chances of winning. Continue reading →

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Posted on July 23, 2026 by AdminUN

GRIEVANCE DRAFTING TIPS 4, 5, & 6

Before we turn to three other parts of a grievance where you can boost its winning potential and impact, remember this.  If you were unable to draft the grievance broadly enough during the grievance stage, often arbitrators will allow the parties to deviate from the exact wording of the grievance and the management responses when crafting the formal issues statement for him.  If you have that opportunity, here is an example of how a promotion-related grievance might be written for the arbitrator, “Did the agency violate Article X, Section Y of the parties’ agreement or any law, rule or regulation when it denied the following individuals promotion.” So, now let’s turn away from the grievance issue to look at your other opportunities. Continue reading →

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Posted on July 14, 2026 by AdminUN

NFFE WINS BREAKTHROUGH TELEWORK ARBITRATION AWARD

NFFE’s General Counsel’s shop has done all of us a favor with its recent arbitration victory. Like most unions since Trump’s anti-common sense decision to stamp out telework, it has had to file grievances and move them to arbitration to protect its members. In its newest case, it protested the Forest Service’s decision to unilaterally wipe it out despite some very clear contract language. More importantly, it asked for the most aggressive remedy I have seen so far in these telework decisions. Continue reading →

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Posted on July 14, 2026 by AdminUN

ARE THE DOUGLAS FACTORS GONE?

Not yet, but Trump’s appointees are doing their best to punish federal employees just for being part of the government that came after him and the January 6th terrorists.  Its latest revenge initiative, but hardly its last, is to take away the Douglas Factors which for decades have protected employees from arbitrary disciplinary penalties.  This is a big deal.  A VERY BIG DEAL. It would permit a manager to fire a 30-year employee for showing up 15 minutes late one day in his entire  career. There would be no consideration of mitigating factors, how similarly situated employees were disciplined or even the harm and cost to the government of dismissing a fed with decades of experience and training for a trivial infraction. (Oh, that we could fire Trump or his drones when they made a single mistake.  Bye, bye RFK Jr. for the measles disaster; so long Hegseth for pushing the war with Iran; and hasta la vista Attorney General Blanche for the illegal and unethical deal givng the Trump family immunity from federal income taxes forever. But I digress.) Continue reading →

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Posted on July 9, 2026 by AdminUN

TWO FEDS GET SHARE OF $1.7 MILLION FINE AGAINST CHEATING CONTRACTORS

Private contractors are everywhere in government because a bundle of politicians believe that private sector firms can always do the work faster, better, and cheaper than federal employees.  I could give you a list as long as my arm of studies and cases where that was shown to be wildly untrue, but the politicians love the campaign contributions contractors send with the money they get from federal contractors.  In any event, federal employees are in the best position to spot when contractors are padding their bills or otherwise defrauding the government. Consequently, while they should know that when they do they can get a share of the fine the government imposes on the contractor, the first step is to make sure stewards know about this.  After all, they are most likely to hear co-workers talking about any contractor rip-offs. So, we thought we would pass along a post from The Employment Law Group, a law firm operating in D.C., that wrote about how it got two federal employees big bucks for blowing the whistle on some contractor games. Check out the short piece here.

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Posted on July 9, 2026 by AdminUN

WHEN CO-WORKERS HARASS EEO COMPLAINANTS

An employee filed an EEO complaint alleging disparate treatment, which was found to be without merit.  However, before the agency dismissed the complaint, the supervisors put out the word that they were going to begin rigidly enforce several work rules because employees were filing EEO complainants when they granted exceptions.  EEOC found that as a result, Agents began making disparaging comments about their coworkers. These comments included: (1) that management needed to “handle” Agents who were filing EEO complaints; (2) asking who was going to file a complaint next; (3) that employees needed to stop filing EEO complaints because it was making it hard for everyone else; (4) that rules were only being enforced because of EEO complaints and/or “Complainant and other EEO complainers”; (5) that someone needed to “deal with” those who filed EEO complaints. Others said the EEO complainant needed to “watch his ass.” And they made the comments in front of the employees who had filed complaints. But what could the employee do if the threatening comments were made by co-workers, not managers? Continue reading →

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Posted on July 9, 2026 by AdminUN

MAGIC WORDS NOT REQUIRED

What if you tell your supervisor that you are finding it very difficult to accomplish an assigned task because of a physical or mental problem and he does nothing?  Then, soon thereafter you get an unacceptable performance rating and not long after that a removal notice. Can you file a disability discrimination case even if you never formally requested a reasonable accommodation? Continue reading →

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Posted on June 18, 2026 by AdminUN

THE MANY LOGICAL FALLACIES OF JUDGE HARRY T. EDWARDS’  COVERED-BY DOCTRINE

Federal Circuit Court Judge Edwards and I both took our high school lessons in logic, reasoning, proof, and bias in the little town of Uniondale, NY—named after a union training center once located there.  There we learned about fallacies, i.e., the use of invalid or otherwise faulty reasoning in the construction of an argument or conclusion, e.g., all dogs are dangerous because I was bitten by one. They are used to persuade by deception, even though they can appear quite valid at first glance. So, I am at a loss to understand how the Judge so recklessly built his defense of the covered-by (CB) doctrine on a bundle of fallacies. Given that his fellow judges are currently considering the NLRB’s rejection of the covered-by doctrine in a case known as Endurance Environmental Solution v. NLRB, it seems like a good time to shine a little light on the loads of illogical babble the CB doctrine rests atop. Consequently, I have listed below the many fallacies in his latest covered-by decision (DOJ v. FLRA, 875 F.3d 667 (2017), with an occasional reference to his 1992 one (Dep’t. of the Navy v. FLRA, 962 F.2d 48 (D.C.Cir. 1992), which first introduced the federal sector to the Harry T. Edwards covered-by doctrine. Continue reading →

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Posted on June 11, 2026 by AdminUN

REMEMBER THIS REMEDY

We like to highlight employee and union victories where an employer is not simply ordered to cease and desist. Frankly, that kind of verdict is near worthless because it does not compensate the employee or union for any harm done.  Just as importantly, it does nothing to motivate the employer not to violate its obligations in the future. So, when we came across a decision titled Emilia Z. v. Pete Hegseth, Sec’y DoD, (Department of Defense Education Activity), EEOC No. 2023004545 (2026) we knew it was worth remembering as a model for even remotely similar cases because EEOC imposed remedies we have never seen before. Emila, a secretary at Fort Campbell, filed an EEO complaint alleging discrimination on the bases of physical disability and in reprisal for protected EEO activity. EEOC found the agency at fault in large part because the Southeast District Chief of Staff questioned Complainant about her medical condition in front of a co-worker. As a result, EEOC clobbered the agency with an order that it do nine things to correct the situation. They are as follows: Continue reading →

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