A worker reclassification policy revived from President Donald Trump’s first administration could strip some civil service protections from federal workers and lead to the firing of thousands of employees at the Social Security Administration.

As the Woodlawn-based agency struggles with phone wait times of over an hour and constant personnel changes, Acting Commissioner Leland Dudek has instructed staff to reclassify all senior executives, leaders and advisers, as well as the entire Office of the Commissioner, to the new “Schedule Policy/Career,” the publication Government Executive reported Tuesday.

Dudek is working to implement Trump’s executive order on reclassification, which is similar to one the president issued near the end of his first term.

Trump has argued that it’s too difficult to fire federal workers who are engaged in “insubordination or serious misconduct" and said he plans to address that by reclassifying policy-related roles.

Reclassification could many shift federal workers to “at-will” status, remove union and civil servant protections and give Trump the power to push agencies to hire and fire based on political loyalties rather than merit.

It could affect an estimated 3,500 bargaining unit members at the Social Security Administration, said Shelley Washington, executive vice president of the American Federation of Government Employees Local 1923. Rich Couture, spokesman for AFGE’s Social Security Administration general committee, put the number closer to 7,000.

The impact on the agency could be even greater, since many of the affected employees aren’t part of the union.

“If the agency or the management that you’re under doesn’t feel as if you’re performing properly to their standards, they’re basically able to just walk employees out the door at any moment,” Washington said. “That will be detrimental to the public service.”

About 10,000 people worked for Social Security in Maryland as of last year, according to federal data. It wasn’t immediately clear how many of the state’s employees would be subject to reclassification.

The U.S. Office of Personnel Management estimates that 50,000 federal workers, roughly 2% of the overall federal workforce, will be reclassified, according to a White House fact sheet.

The executive order is being challenged in court by AFGE, which represents more than 800,000 federal workers nationwide, the American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees (AFSCME), and others.

Representatives for the Social Security Administration did not respond to multiple requests for comment.

Trump’s decision stems from his campaign promise to “fire rogue bureaucrats and career politicians,” and to do so “very aggressively,” Trump said in a video on his campaign website in March 2023.

The move from the Trump administration comes as it continues its pursuit of shrinking the federal government through layoffs, buyouts and early retirements.

The Trump administration has tasked Dudek with reducing the Social Security Administration’s 57,000 workers to 50,000. However, The Washington Post reported that the agency already reached its target number and continues to look for ways to cut staff even more.

Dudek consolidated internal and regional offices, and in February, he closed the agency’s Office of Civil Rights and Equal Opportunity and the Office of Transformation, terminating or putting on leave nearly 200 employees. In March, the agency announced it would terminate contracts and grants, freeze hiring and cancel office leases.

More than 360 employees chose to be placed on leave through the government’s Deferred Resignation Program, the agency reported. Another 2,250 workers volunteered for reassignment but when told what the reassignment was, less than half accepted.

The Social Security Administration will target high-level employees under its Offices of Disability Adjudication, External Affairs, Mission Support, General Counsel, and the Office of the Chief Information Officer, according to an email from Dudek reviewed by Government Executive.

Nearly 11,000 employees are within Social Security’s highest ranks, according to its 2023 annual report.

The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) notified some of its employees, mostly in high-level positions, of their Schedule Policy/Career status earlier this month, Government Executive reported.

Former President Joe Biden rescinded Trump’s 2020 executive order shortly after taking office. The Office of Personnel Management also issued a rule last April to make it challenging for future presidents to hire and fire federal workers based on political loyalties.

However, Trump reinstated the classification policy on Day One of his second term by amending and renaming his 2020 executive order, and claimed there were “numerous and well-documented cases of federal employees resisting and undermining the policies and directives of their executive leadership.”

The Office of Personnel Management is accepting public comment as it prepares to issue a rule on the policy.

Everett Kelley, president of the AFGE, said in a statement last week that the action from Trump would “politicize the work” of federal employees and “erode the government’s merit-based hiring system.”