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NM attorney general celebrates legal win against mass federal layoffs
New Mexico Attorney General Raúl Torrez speaks during a rally on Capitol Hill in Washington, D.C., in January. Torrez and more than a dozen other attorneys general filed a lawsuit against the Trump administration seeking to overturn his decision to fire thousands of federal employees.
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Attorney General Raúl Torrez, along with 19 of his counterparts, touted a legal victory against the Trump administration’s mass government layoffs after a judge reinstated federal employees this week.
Judge James Bredar in U.S. District Court for Maryland issued a temporary restraining order compelling the federal government to end its mass layoffs of federal probationary employees and reinstate terminated employees by Monday.
Torrez and attorneys general from 18 Democratic states and the District of Columbia filed a lawsuit against President Donald Trump after his administration began a mass firing campaign aimed at drastically shrinking the federal government. Bredar’s decision came hours after a similar ruling from federal Judge William Alsup of California.
“Lacking the notice to which they were entitled, the States weren’t ready for the impact of so many unemployed people,” Bredar wrote in a memorandum. “They are still scrambling to catch up. They remain impaired in their capacities to meet their legal obligations to their citizens.”
Around 3% and 5% of New Mexico’s workforce are federal employees, although the counts vary depending on which federal agency supplies the numbers.
These workers stock the ranks of national parks and the U.S. Forest Service, health services for Native Americans and support services for veterans, among many other programs.
“This ruling is a crucial victory for hardworking federal employees and their families — it sends a clear message that no administration is above the law,” Torrez said in a news release. “These illegal mass layoffs aren’t just about jobs — they represent devastating cuts to the services we all rely on, from health care and education to support for our veterans.”
When the federal government wants to fire employees, the law demands it follow a process. Bredar wrote that those processes — like notifying states that layoffs are happening and giving them time to plan and reprogram — are meant to reduce the harm such actions may have on the states.
The Trump administration argued that it wasn’t required to provide notice because it fired the workers for “performance” reasons.
“On the record before the court, this isn’t true,” Bredar wrote. “There was no individualized assessment of employees. They were all just fired.”
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The other states that filed against the firings were Maryland, Minnesota, Arizona, California, Colorado, Connecticut, Delaware, Hawaii, Illinois, Massachusetts, Michigan, Nevada, New Jersey, New York, Oregon, Rhode Island, Vermont and Wisconsin.
