“The rule was the first thing House Minority Whip Steny H. Hoyer (D-Md.) railed against Tuesday in a floor speech objecting to an overarching rules package, which includes the Holman provision.
“Republicans have consistently made our hard-working federal employees scapegoats, in my opinion, for lack of performance of the federal government itself,” he said. “And this rule change will allow them to make shortsighted and ideologically driven changes to our civil service.”
The rule changes the process of passing spending bills by allowing any rank-and-file House member to propose an amendment that would cut a specific federal program or the jobs of specific federal employees, by slashing their salaries or eliminating their positions altogether.
Before this rule change, an agency’s budget could be cut broadly, but a specific program, employee or groups of employees could not be targeted because of civil service protections.
Republicans and Trump advisers have been quietly drawing up plans since the election to erode some of the job protections and benefits that federal workers have received for a generation, starting with a hiring freeze Trump has pledged to put in place in his first 100 days in office.”
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Anybody who thinks this group is going to govern and exercise power in a responsible manner is likely to be in for a rude awakening. As they have in the past, the GOP wastes time and the People’s money mounting baseless attacks on their own Government, rather than working in a bipartisan manner to solve the real problems facing our country. Most discouraging.
Maybe they need to look inward to see whose efforts aren’t worth what we are paying them. Note that this nonsense was just after the House GOP’s first ordker of business was gutting the ethics rules that keep them in line and make them accountable. Only immediate, widespread public outrage and a swift negative reaction from President-Elect Trump made them back down from that outrageous abuse of power and privilege.
PWS
01/05/17