Government watchdogs fired by Trump sue his administration and ask a judge to reinstate them
WASHINGTON (AP) — Eight government watchdogs have sued over their mass firing that removed oversight of President Donald Trump's new administration.
The lawsuit filed Wednesday in federal court in Washington asks a judge to declare the firings unlawful and restore the inspectors general to their positions at the agencies.
The watchdogs are charged with rooting out waste, fraud, and abuse at government agencies, playing a nonpartisan oversight role over trillions of dollars in federal spending and the conduct of millions of federal employees, according to the lawsuit.
Presidents can remove inspectors general, but the Trump administration did not give Congress a legally required 30-day notice, something that even a top Republican decried.
The White House did not immediately respond to a message seeking comment on the lawsuit. Trump has said he would put new “good people” in the jobs.
The administration dismissed more than a dozen inspectors general in a Friday-night sweep on the fourth full day of Trump's second term. Though inspectors general are presidential appointees, some serve presidents of both parties. All are expected to be nonpartisan. Two of the plaintiffs had been nominated to inspector general roles by Trump in his first term.
“The firing of the independent, nonpartisan inspector general was a clear violation of the law,” said Michael Missal, the former inspector general of the Department of Veterans Affairs. “The IGs are bringing this action for reinstatement so that they can go back to work fighting fraud waste and abuse on behalf the American public.”
At the time of the firings, Sen. Chuck Grassley, R-Iowa, said there may have been good reasons for the terminations but that Congress needed to know.
The lawsuit comes a day after the White House fired the inspector general for the U.S. Agency for International Development, following a warning from his office that the administration’s dismantling of that agency had made it all but impossible to monitor $8.2 billion in unspent humanitarian funds.
The role of the modern-day inspector general dates to post-Watergate Washington, when Congress installed offices inside agencies as an independent check against mismanagement and abuse of power.
Democrats and watchdog groups said the firings raise alarms that Trump is making it easier to take advantage of the government.
Trump, said at the time the firings were “a very common thing to do.” But the lawsuit says that is not true and that mass firings have been considered improper since the 1980s.
The dismissals came through similarly worded emails from the director or deputy director of the Office of Presidential Personnel. The watchdogs' computers, phones, and agency access badges were collected within days. The officials were escorted into their respective agencies to collect their personal belongings under supervision, they said in the lawsuit.
The inspector general of the Agriculture Department, however, returned to work as normal the Monday after being informed of the firing, “recognizing the email as not effective," the lawsuit said. The watchdog conducted several meetings before agency employees cut off her access to government systems and took her computer and phone.
Trump in the past has challenged their authority. In 2020, in his first term, he replaced multiple inspectors general, including those leading the Defense Department and intelligence community, as well as the one tapped to chair a special oversight board for the $2.2 trillion pandemic economic relief package.
The latest round of dismissals spared Michael Horowitz, the longtime Justice Department inspector general who has issued reports on assorted politically explosive criminal investigations over the past decade.
In December 2019, for instance, Horowitz released a report faulting the FBI for surveillance warrant applications in the investigation into ties between Russia and Trump’s 2016 presidential campaign. But the report also found that the investigation had been opened for a legitimate purpose and did not find evidence that partisan bias had guided investigative decisions.
The lawsuit was filed by the inspectors general of the departments of Defense, Veterans Affairs, Health and Human Services, State, Education, Agriculture, and Labor, and the Small Business Administration.
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AP White House Correspondent Zeke Miller contributed to this report.
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