No sign of a revived hiring freeze for now

Shortly after taking office, President Donald Trump took a significant step toward fulfilling his campaign promise to impose “a hiring freeze on all federal employees to reduce (the) federal workforce through attrition,” exempting military, public safety, and public health positions.

Trump imposed a freeze, but in April, his budget director, Mick Mulvaney, released a memo to the heads of executive departments and agencies. Mulvaney said during a press briefing April 11 that the administration would be replacing the initial freeze “with a smarter plan, a more strategic plan, a more surgical plan.” The lifted ban, he said, “does not mean that the agencies will be free to hire willy-nilly.”

Now, roughly nine months later, there is no indication that a broad-based hiring freeze is on tap, the White House told PolitiFact, though some agencies may be continuing to operate under an informal hiring freeze.

Data from the federal Office of Personnel Management suggests that beyond the areas exempted in Trump’s campaign promise — namely military, public safety, and public health positions — recent hiring trends in cabinet-level agencies have been mixed.

The departments of Justice, Labor, Energy, Education, Housing and Urban Development, State, Transportation, and Treasury have all seen declines in employment over the past four quarters, though the decreases have generally been modest.

Other departments, including Agriculture, Commerce, Interior, and Veterans Affairs, saw modest increases. Here’s a summary by Cabinet agency:

Overall, the federal workforce hasn’t grown or shrunk much at all since Trump has been in office, according to Office of Personnel Management figures:

Trump’s promise — to use attrition to shrink the federal workforce — isn’t currently enforced by a formal order, and there is little evidence that the number of federal workers is shrinking noticeably. We rate this promise Stalled.