AS MASS LAYOFFS of federal employees get underway, the Trump administration is undermining avenues for workers to challenge their terminations by firing members of the independent boards that would hear their cases, paralyzing them, Parker Purifoy and Courtney Rozen report.

• Trump’s Feb. 11 directive that agency heads “undertake preparations to initiate large-scale reductions in force,” focusing on discharging workers who “perform functions not mandated by statute,” runs contrary to federal regulations requiring agencies to write a detailed list of jobs they want to cut. Other rules say employees must get 60 days’ notice of termination, and be ranked by such factors as tenure, veteran status, and performance ratings.
• Ignoring the rules means employees covered by union contracts may be able to take the issue to arbitration, while others can go to independent panels that mediate worker disputes. Courts have made clear that aggrieved federal workers must take their complaints to their agency, and any relevant review boards, before turning to the courts. But those boards are diminished, reducing workers’ legal options.
• Employees who believe they were fired because of their race or sex, for instance, could opt for an Equal Employment Opportunity Commission administrative judge to hear their dispute. But the EEOC lacks a quorum after Trump fired two Democratic members. At the Federal Labor Relations Authority, which enforces labor laws for the federal workforce, Trump’s firing of former Chair Susan Grundmann leaves the FLRA’s remaining two members with a partisan deadlock. There’s another deadlock at the Merit Systems Protection Board, charged with mediating disagreements between agencies and their workers, after Trump fired Democratic member Cathy A. Harris.
• Trump is “going to keep these agencies underutilized or defunct, where they’re not able to function,” said Suzanne Summerlin, an employment attorney. Read More

More Coverage:

• Trump Administration Lays Off About 1,300 Employees at the CDC
• Musk’s Top DOGE Staffer at VA Worked Quietly Before Its Layoffs

CORPORATE LEADERS are shifting from personally courting President Donald Trump at Mar-a-Lago to making Washington pilgrimages in an effort to influence policies and mitigate negative effects of tariffs and regulation overhauls that are already impacting their companies’ stock prices, Emma Court, Jeff Green, and Emily Birnbaum report.

• One recent trip saw the chief executives of General Motors and Ford meeting with lobbyists, trade groups, and Republican Congress members from states in the so-called Battery Belt in an attempt to delay a repeal of Biden-era electric-vehicle tax credits and talk about tariffs. “President Trump has talked a lot about making our US auto industry stronger, bringing more production here,” Ford CEO Jim Farley said at a conference ahead of his trip, adding that would be a “signature accomplishment.” But “so far, what we’re seeing is a lot of cost, a lot of chaos.”
• Businesses typically adjust their approach to suit every new administration. But Trump is moving more quickly this time around to implement his agenda. His proclamations are disrupting markets, hiring and investment decisions, supply chains, and unit economics — and companies are engaging earlier and more intensely with Trump, and are more cautious about what they say publicly.
• Corporations are also adjusting in other ways. Meta named UFC CEO and Trump ally Dana White to its board. Others are looking to K Street, where there’s been a boom in business for MAGA shops selling their insights into and connections with the new administration. Read More

THE BRAINCHILD of Venezuelan-born wealth fund manager Erick Brimen, Prospera touts itself as the world’s most ambitious experiment in self-governance: a city-state on a sun-drenched Honduran island with single-digit tax rates, its own set of industry regulations, and even a court system staffed by retired Arizona judges who hear cases online, Umar Farooq and Michael D. McDonald report.

• But the libertarian ideal has given way to an existential crisis. The Honduran president who championed the so-called “special economic zones” legislation that allowed Prospera’s development sits in a US prison, convicted of drug trafficking. His successor has assailed the project as the shady creation of a “narco-regime.” The nation’s highest court has ruled the law underpinning it was unconstitutional.
• Now, former supporters are skeptics. Paul Romer, a Nobel-winning economist and World Bank leader, once touted the city-state concept to spur development in impoverished nations. Prospera’s developers have lost their way, he said, living “in this libertarian fantasy that took root early in this project, that this will be a place they can be free of the government. That’s not gonna turn out well.”
• Brimen for his part, is not giving up. He’s filed an $11 billion claim against Honduras, and awaits a ruling from an international arbitration tribunal. He’s spent hundreds of thousands of dollars lobbying Washington lawmakers. Allies have called for an end to US aid if Honduran President Xiomara Castro doesn’t halt her attack on Prospera. Read More

THE TRUMP ADMINISTRATION is exerting “considerable influence” to persuade private companies to abandon DEI practices, Rob Chesnut writes in his Good Counsel column. How should companies approach the debate?

• “A call from the government can pressure test what you stand for, and that ultimately will make you stronger,” Rob writes, noting the answers may vary by company. Read More

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