A federal judge has ruled that recent mass layoffs at the US Department of Health and Human Services were likely unlawful and ordered the Trump administration to halt plans to downsize and reorganize the nation\u2019s health workforce. <\/p>\n
US District Judge Melissa DuBose granted the preliminary injunction sought by a coalition of attorneys general from 19 states and the District of Columbia in a lawsuit filed in early May. <\/p>\n
DuBose said the states had shown \u201cirreparable harm,\u201d from the cuts and were likely to prevail in their claims that \u201cHHS\u2019s action was both arbitrary and capricious as well as contrary to law.\u201d <\/p>\n
\u201cThe executive branch does not have the authority to order, organize, or implement wholesale changes to the structure and function of the agencies created by Congress,\u201d DuBose wrote in a 58-page order handed down in US District Court in Providence, Rhode Island, on Tuesday. <\/p>\n
Her order blocks the Trump administration from finalizing layoffs announced in March or issuing any further firings. HHS is directed to file a status report by July 11. <\/p>\n
The ruling applies to terminated employees in four divisions of HHS: the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention; the Center for Tobacco Products within the Food and Drug Administration; the Office of Head Start within the Administration for Children and Families and employees of regional offices who work on Head Start matters; and the Office of the Assistant Secretary for Planning and Evaluation. <\/p>\n
Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. eliminated more than 10,000 employees in late March and consolidated 28 agencies to 15. Since then, agencies including the CDC have repeatedly rescinded layoffs affecting hundreds of employees, including in branches that monitor HIV, hepatitis and other diseases. <\/p>\n
The attorneys general argued that the massive restructuring was arbitrary and outside of the scope of the agency\u2019s authority. The lawsuit also says that the action decimated essential programs and pushed burdensome costs onto states. <\/p>\n
\u201cThe intended effect \u2026 was the wholesale elimination of many HHS programs that are critical to public health and safety,\u201d the lawsuit argued. <\/p>\n
The cuts are part of a federal \u201cMake America Healthy Again\u201d directive to streamline costly agencies and reduce redundancies. Kennedy told senators at a May 14 hearing that there is \u201cso much chaos and disorganization\u201d at HHS. <\/p>\n
But the restructuring had eliminated key teams that regulate food safety and drugs, as well as support a wide range of programs for tobacco, HIV prevention and maternal and infant health. Kennedy has since said that because of mistakes, 20% of people fired might be reinstated. <\/p>\n
The states who joined the lawsuit have Democratic governors, and many of the same states \u2014 plus a few others \u2014 also sued the Trump administration over $11 billion in cuts to public health funding. A preliminary injunction was granted in that case in mid-May. <\/p>\n<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
A federal judge has ruled that recent mass layoffs at the US Department of Health and Human Services were likely unlawful and ordered the Trump administration to halt plans to downsize and reorganize the nation\u2019s health workforce. US District Judge Melissa DuBose granted the preliminary injunction sought by a coalition of attorneys general from 19 <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":3938,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[22],"tags":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-3937","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-health-news"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/usamedicarestore.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3937","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/usamedicarestore.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/usamedicarestore.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/usamedicarestore.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/usamedicarestore.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=3937"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/usamedicarestore.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3937\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/usamedicarestore.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/3938"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/usamedicarestore.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=3937"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/usamedicarestore.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=3937"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/usamedicarestore.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=3937"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}