Donald Trump has declared that he has “every right” to seek retaliation by ordering the Department of Justice to prosecute his political opponents, a clear indication that he views the government as an instrument of his own personal will, rather than the will of the American people as a whole.
Let him say this: He has made no secret of the fact that he plans to gut a lot of institutions with his vision in mind if voters decide to give him a second chance in the White House. But one plan hasn't received enough attention: Trump's desire to replace today's professional civil service system with his own version of the 19th century “spoils system.”
He's already tried to do so: Near the end of his presidency, Trump issued an executive order that would have allowed him to fire tens of thousands of government employees in policy positions and replace them with political allies through a new program known as “Schedule F.”
President Biden rescinded the order shortly after taking office, and if re-elected, Trump would likely swiftly reinstate Schedule F and undoubtedly expand its scope. Indeed, Treasury Department documents obtained under the Freedom of Information Act indicate that his plans for the department are far more sweeping than the administration has indicated, with the Schedule F designation extending to lower-level aides and experts who have no role in policymaking.
Follow this authorKaren Tumulty's opinion
Although politicians had doled out jobs to their cronies since the dawn of the republic, the practice of firing government officials and replacing them with less qualified political supporters really took off after Andrew Jackson's election in 1828. “To the victor belongeth the spoils of his enemy,” New York Senator William L. Marcy declared.
Calls for reform grew after a frustrated job seeker assassinated President James Garfield in 1881. Two years later, the Pendleton Act created the civil service system, which eventually expanded to require that most government jobs be filled by merit and competitive examinations. It also provided protections that prevented these employees from being fired or demoted without cause.
In the eyes of Trump and his allies, that system has become the loathed “deep state.” Or, as the 180-day “transition playbook” compiled by a group of conservative think tanks led by the Heritage Foundation puts it, “A president entering office today finds himself faced with a vast federal bureaucracy that too often is carrying out its own policy agenda and preferences, or, worse, those of the country’s radical, so-called ‘woke’ factions.”
Unfortunately, this suspicion of government officials isn't limited to right-wing zealots: Trump is exploiting and stoking a general loss of trust among Americans.
A new survey by the nonpartisan Partnership for Public Service to be released Tuesday finds that just 23% say they have confidence in the federal government, down from 35% in 2022. Sixty-six percent say they believe the government is incompetent, up 10 points from two years ago, with increasingly negative sentiment across all demographic groups, Republicans, Democrats and independents.
This overall sentiment toward the federal government partly reflects Americans' general distaste for the constant bickering among elected leaders in Washington, said Max Steer, president of the Partnership for Public Service. It also partly highlights disparities in the quality of services Americans receive from their government.
But the survey also found that two-thirds of respondents believe that many civil servants work to undermine policies they oppose, and fewer than a quarter believe career officials are truly nonpartisan.
At the same time, they don't want to see career civil servants replaced by politicians: More than nine in 10 (94% of Democrats and 91% of Republicans and Independents) say “competent civil servants” are essential to a well-functioning democracy.
So how do we restore public trust? The Partnership's report recommends ways to reform and strengthen the civil service without destroying it, including through leadership development, streamlining performance evaluations, and strengthening accountability. It also suggests that modernizing the government's use of technology and data can help make better decisions about the effectiveness and success of federal programs.
“Americans don't need convincing that an effective federal government and a strong executive branch are important to a vibrant democracy,” the report states. “But too many people feel they don't get the government they want or deserve, and this distrust makes the nation's problems more difficult to resolve. At the same time, Americans don't want more politics in the way their government operates.”
The bureaucracy is certainly ripe for a makeover, but if Trump gets his way, Americans will get the worst possible outcome: a bureaucracy made up of amateurs and ideologues, accountable only to him.
