"The statutory exemption Congress wrote into Title 5 was deliberately narrow, reserved for agencies like the Central Intelligence Agency whose missions are uniquely incompatible with bargaining," Daniel Horowitz wrote.
Daniel Horowitz and the American Federation of Government Employees appeal
Last week the nation’s largest federal employee union, the American Federation of Government Employees (AFGE), asked House lawmakers to again block the Defense Department from implementing President Trump’s executive order that strips collective bargaining rights from most federal employees. AFGE legislative director Daniel Horowitz sent a letter to the top Democrat and Republican on the House Armed Services Committee urging the panel to approve a proposal that would nullify the president’s action "as it pertains to Defense Department workers."
The appeal comes after Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth ordered AFGE contracts terminated in April. AFGE’s request revives language first proposed by Rep. Donald Norcross, D‑N.J., and included last year in the House version of the 2026 National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA) before the Senate removed it from its bill.
President Trump's executive orders and the Civil Service Reform Act
In March 2025, President Trump signed an executive order banning unions at most federal agencies, invoking a seldom-used provision of the 1978 Civil Service Reform Act that permits exempting a workforce from federal-sector labor law on national security grounds. A second executive order, signed last August, added roughly a half-dozen more agencies to the original edict.
Horowitz disputed the administration’s interpretation of that legal authority, saying the Title 5 exemption was intended to be narrow and reserved for agencies with missions "uniquely incompatible with bargaining." The letter points out that President Trump did not invoke that exemption during his first term, and that in 2020 he sought to delegate the authority to then‑Defense Secretary Mark Esper, who ultimately declined to use it.
Congressional maneuvering: Norcross amendment, House passage, and the Senate response
Last year the House included Rep. Norcross’s amendment in its NDAA and the full House passed the bill with the provision intact. The bipartisan House Armed Services Committee had earlier voted to include the language. The measure, however, did not become law after the Senate stripped the provision from its version of the NDAA and ultimately blocked the House effort to halt the policy at the Pentagon.
Horowitz’s letter noted that a group of 16 House Republicans also urged members of the bicameral conference committee to keep the Norcross amendment in place, warning that the presidential edict "jeopardizes" rather than strengthens national security.
Court challenges and mixed agency outcomes
The executive orders and their implementation have been tied up in a "myriad of court cases" since they were announced. According to the record released with the appeal, governmentwide lawsuits seeking to stop the initiative have, to date, been unsuccessful in halting its rollout. Still, the litigation and individual bargaining-unit actions have produced uneven results across agencies.
Some unions have preserved collective-bargaining rights for particular groups of federal employees, including Defense Department workers represented by the International Federation of Professional and Technical Engineers and the Federal Education Association. AFGE, by contrast, saw its contracts at the Pentagon terminated when the defense secretary took action in April.
What this means for the Defense Department, AFGE, and the House Armed Services Committee
- Defense Department: The Pentagon has, according to AFGE’s appeal, "safeguards" to ensure collective-bargaining activity does not interfere with national security. Horowitz argues that existing agreements already contain management rights, emergency authorities, and national security exemptions that permit commanders and program managers to act when mission needs demand.
- AFGE: The union is pressing lawmakers to restore bargaining at the Defense Department and emphasizes that collective bargaining is a channel for identifying operational problems before they become mission failures, improving safety, retention, productivity, and accountability.
- House Armed Services Committee: Committee members face a choice the panel has already confronted once — whether to reinsert the Norcross amendment or allow the administration’s exemption to remain in force for Defense Department employees, while the broader litigation proceeds.
The dispute centers on competing interpretations of a narrow Title 5 exemption, a fragmented legal record, and prior congressional action that passed the House but stalled in the Senate. With AFGE contracts canceled at the Pentagon and litigation unresolved, the House Armed Services Committee’s next move will determine whether the question is decided legislatively for Defense Department employees or continues to be played out in court.
