Swamp vs. Trump: IRS Union Sues to Reverse Executive Order

Another chapter in President Donald Trump’s clash with what he calls the Washington, D.C., “swamp” is heading to court, this time, from the union representing mostly Internal Revenue Service employees. 

The National Treasury Employees Union filed a lawsuit Wednesday in federal court in the District of Columbia. The Treasury Department was among the departments included in Trump’s March executive order ending collective bargaining for many federal employees. 

The National Treasury Employees Union represents 38 different federal departments, and IRS employees are the largest group the union represents, The Associated Press reported.

The lawsuit says Trump’s executive order eliminated the collective bargaining rights for two-thirds of the nearly 160,000 federal employees who are members of the union. 

“With respect to the exclusions order, the president’s exemptions were retaliatory and not based on the statutory criteria,” the union complaint says. 

“The administration’s own issuances show that the president’s exclusions were not based on national security concerns, but instead a policy objective of making federal employees easier to fire and political animus against federal sector unions,” the complaint continued. 

The March order affected the departments of Justice, State, Defense, Treasury, Veterans Affairs, and Health and Human Services.

Last week, Trump signed a second executive order eliminating collective bargaining for more federal employees across multiple agencies, such as NASA, the Patent and Trademark Office, and the U.S. Agency for Global Media.

The National Treasury Employees Union also represents employees of the Patent Office. The complaint names as defendants Trump, Office of Personnel Management Director Scott Kupor, and Patent and Trademark Office acting Director Coke Morgan Stewart. 

For both executive orders, Trump used a provision in the 1978 Civil Service Reform Act that allows the president to end collective bargaining with federal unions with national security missions.

“The Federal Labor Relations Authority (FLRA) defines national security to include protecting America’s economic and productive strength,” a March fact sheet from the White House says. “The Treasury Department collects the taxes that fund the government and ensures the stable operations of the financial system.”

Shortly after the March executive order, the Treasury Department sued the National Treasury Employees Union to cancel the union contracts of tens of thousands of IRS employees. A federal judge in Kentucky rejected the case.