The American Geophysical Union has joined several federal employee unions in a lawsuit that asserts the Trump administration’s directive to fire probationary workers at the National Science Foundation and other agencies is illegal.
The lawsuit, filed before a US District Court in California, says the downstream impacts of reduced federal scientific expertise and funding on research has harmed the economy, public health, environment and national security.
Janice Lachance, interim executive director and CEO of AGU, said:
“The Administration’s callous, indiscriminate firings of critical public servants have weakened the scientific enterprise, which in turn inflicts great harm upon the public. From the air we breathe to the food we eat to protecting our communities in the face of natural disasters, federal science and scientists are vital to safety and our national security.”
AGU joins existing plaintiffs including the American Federation of State, County, and Municipal Employees (AFSCME), the United Nurses Association of California and several nonprofit organizations, such as the Coalition to Protect America’s National Parks and the Western Watersheds Project.
An evidentiary hearing for the court case, American Federation of Government Employees, AFL-CIO v. United States Office of Personnel Management (OPM) (3:25-cv-01780), is scheduled for Thursday, March 13.
The Trump administration and tech billionaire Elon Musk have been going through various government agencies, looking for areas where the workforce could be cut or work itself could be changed. One of those agencies is the US National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, which last month was ordered to stop communicating with foreign partners and participating with international organizations.
Project 2025, a “180-day playbook” promulgated by the conservative Heritage Foundation that some Trump administration officials are using, says:
“[T]he next conservative president should consider whether … The National Oceanographic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) should be dismantled and many of its functions eliminated, sent to other agencies, privatized, or placed under the control of states and territories.”
The report further looks at NOAA’s six main offices:
- The National Weather Service
- The National Ocean Service
- The Oceanic and Atmospheric Research office
- The National Environmental Satellite, Data and Information Service
- The National Marine Fisheries Service, and
- The Office of Marine and Aviation Operations and NOAA Corps
About them, Project 2025 states:
“Together, these form a colossal operation that has become one of the main
drivers of the climate change alarm industry and, as such, is harmful to future U.S. prosperity. This industry’s mission emphasis on prediction and management seems designed around the fatal conceit of planning for the unplannable. That is not to say NOAA is useless, but its current organization corrupts its useful functions. It should be broken up and downsized.
“NOAA today boasts that it is a provider of environmental information services, a provider of environmental stewardship services, and a leader in applied scientific research. Each of these functions could be provided commercially, likely at lower cost and higher quality.”
