Judge in SF Extends Order Halting Mass Federal Layoffs, Saying Trump Exceeded Authority

Updated 12:07 p.m. Friday

A federal judge in San Francisco extended a court-ordered halt to the Trump administration’s mass layoff of federal workers on Thursday evening.

U.S. District Judge Susan Illston granted a preliminary injunction that was sought by labor unions and cities — one of multiple legal challenges to Republican President Donald Trump’s efforts to shrink the size of a federal government he calls bloated and expensive.

“The evidence before the court suggests that plaintiffs will likely succeed on the merits of their claims that the President, the Office of Management and Budget, the Office of Personnel Management and DOGE, have exceeded their authority by directing large scale reductions in force and reorganizations,” Illston said at the start of a Thursday hearing.

An earlier temporary restraining order in the case was set to expire on Friday.

Illston said a decision to extend the order “remains necessary to preserve the status quo and protect the power of the legislative branch.”

Trump has repeatedly said voters gave him a mandate to remake the federal government, and he tapped billionaire Elon Musk to lead the charge through DOGE.

Tens of thousands of federal workers have been fired, left their jobs via deferred resignation programs or have been placed on leave as a result of Trump’s government-shrinking efforts.

There is no official figure for the job cuts, but at least 75,000 federal employees took deferred resignation, according to the White House, and thousands of probationary workers have already been let go.

The judge also moved to apply the injunction retrospectively to workers who’ve already been placed on administrative leave, but she paused that from taking effect pending a decision in the case, to prevent workers from being “ping-ponged” on and off the job.

Attorneys for The American Federation of Government Employees and the AFL-CIO have also asked the court to require the Trump administration to provide detailed reports on how they are complying with the temporary injunction.

In making her decision, Illston said she considered 1,500 pages of evidence from attorneys of federal employees. The government chose not to present evidence to support its position that the mass firings and reorganizations were legal.

“ Upon receiving a fuller evidentiary record, my conclusions may change,” Illston said, “but the evidence before the court today strongly suggests that the recent actions of the executive branch usurp the constitutional powers of Congress.”

On Friday, the Trump administration appealed to the U.S. Supreme Court to lift Illston’s previous order.