Rank-and-file lawyers in the U.S. federal government are seeking private-sector jobs in unusually high numbers, fearing major budget cuts once President-elect Donald Trump takes office, five legal recruiters told Reuters.
Each new administration triggers an exodus of political appointees and other high-ranking legal officials, but recruiters said they are hearing from a much larger number of junior and career government lawyers this year.
“It feels completely different than the transition to the first Trump administration,” said Rachel Nonaka, a former Securities and Exchange Commission lawyer turned recruiter in Washington.
Dan Binstock, another Washington recruiter, said government lawyers have contacted his firm, Garrison, at five times the usual rate since the election, and many more of them are career civil servants.
“The level of uncertainty is like nothing we’ve ever seen,” said Binstock, who has worked as a recruiter for 20 years.
More than 44,000 licensed attorneys work for the federal government, according to March data from the U.S. Office of Personnel Management. About a third of these lawyers work at the Justice Department, and fewer than 400 of them are non-career political appointees.
The Department of Education, which Trump has said he wants to abolish, employs about 600 lawyers. The number of lawyers across all Cabinet agencies increased by about 2,500 during the Trump and Biden administrations.
This month, Trump created a new, informal Department of Government Efficiency led by billionaire Tesla CEO Elon Musk and former biotech executive Vivek Ramaswamy. Vivek Ramaswamy argued last week that executive action to eliminate regulations could pave the way for massive cuts in the federal workforce. .
“The Trump administration will have a place for people who work in government and are committed to protecting the rights of the American people, putting America first, and making the most of workers’ tax dollars,” Moon said. – Brian Hughes, transition spokesman, said in a statement.
Trump has accused government lawyers of interfering with his first-term agenda and faces two federal criminal charges over what he described as a politicized Justice Department under incumbent President Joe Biden. His appointee, Attorney General Pam Bondi, called for an investigation into how the cases were prosecuted.
“Prosecutors will be prosecuted,” Bondi told Fox News last year. Bad people. Investigators will investigate,” he said.
In June, U.S. Attorney General Merrick Garland dismissed accusations from House Republicans that he had politicized the criminal justice system and accused him of spreading conspiracy theories that could endanger federal agents.
