Fired Health and Human Services staffers have brought a lawsuit claiming the April 1 termination of thousands of federal workers was unlawful due to the use of faulty personnel records.
The lawsuit was filed by former employees Tuesday in federal court for the District of Columbia. It names HHS, Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr., former head of the Department of Government Efficiency Elon Musk, DOGE Administrator Amy Gleason, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, the Food and Drug Administration and the Office of Management and Budget, among others.
It asks for damages of not less than $1,000 per person, a declaratory judgment that the use of inaccurate and incomplete data was used in connection with the April 1 Reduction in Force (RIF), costs and attorneys' fees.
The defendants have 60 days to answer the complaint.
WHY THIS MATTERS
In the weeks leading up to the terminations, HHS shared personnel records with DOGE, the Office of Personnel Management and the Office of Management and Budget, the lawsuit said.
"These agencies knew that the records were hopelessly error-ridden, and that the records should have been used, if at all, with great caution," the lawsuit said. "Instead of taking steps to verify the contents of the records and correct systemic inaccuracies, the agencies promptly used them to fire 10,000 employees."
Lead plaintiff Catherine Jackson worked in the Seattle, Washington, regional office for the Office of Child Care for the Administration of Children and Families, supporting Alaska and American Indian Tribes, according to court documents.
On April 1, Jackson received an RIF notice citing a performance rating of three, when she had never received a score lower than four, the lawsuit said. Jackson, 68, said she is looking for work. Her retirement annuity would have vested in a few months, according to the lawsuit.
All of the plaintiffs said they lost their jobs due to flawed personnel records.
The lawsuit is based on the ability for individuals to seek recourse when an agency takes adverse action against them based on an inaccurate record, they said.
HHS Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. acknowledged that the department knew they were making mistakes in carrying out the RIF, the complaint said.
The lawsuit quotes RFK Jr. as saying, "Personnel that should not have been cut, were cut. We're reinstating them. And that was always the plan. Part of the – at DOGE, we talked about this from the beginning, is we're going to do 80% cuts, but 20% of those are going to have to be reinstated, because we'll make mistakes."
"HHS's intentional failure to maintain complete and accurate records before making life-changing employment decisions was a clear violation of the law," the lawsuit said. "And plaintiffs suffered real harm immediately, which will remain unredressed, even if their jobs are eventually reinstated."
THE LARGER TREND
On April 2, HHS employees began receiving notices that their jobs were being eliminated. About 10,000 people were laid off, and another 10,000 were expected to take early retirement and voluntary separation offers, in a move to cut roughly 20,000 jobs and shrink HHS down to about 62,000 positions.
Currently, an appeals court has allowed a pause on all layoffs at most major federal agencies to remain in place, rejecting the Trump administration's bid to block a lower court's injunction and likely sending the matter to the Supreme Court, according to Government Executive.
On Tuesday, Government Executive released another report that the Trump administration is looking to slash a net of 107,000 employees at nondefense agencies next fiscal year, a 7% reduction in that workforce. Agencies laid out their workforce reductions in an expanded version of President Trump's fiscal 2026 budget released May 30.
Email the writer: SMorse@himss.org