Some social media users claim that the president’s actions are in line with those of former president Bill Clinton as unions and Democrats criticize the Trump administration’s plan to reduce the federal workforce through worker buyouts.
“To all you Democrats freaking out over President Trump’s buyout programme, I present to you a piece of history”, LD Basler, a retired federal law enforcement officer, wrote on X. Clinton made a statement a year after signing the Federal Workforce Restructuring Act, according to his post, which was quoted as 1995.
“I guess Clinton didn’t have the authority either, when he did it in the 90s? (Because) the precedent was set BY DEMOCRATS”, another , X user , wrote.
Is that true?
Under Clinton, the government offered mass buyouts. However, the situation under President Donald Trump is significant because, following months of deliberation, a bipartisan Congress overwhelmingly approved Clinton’s program.
By contrast,  , Trump’s “deferred resignation” offer, conversationally known as a buyout, emerged within a week of his inauguration, with lots of uncertainty about the terms.
“We spent six months, involved several hundred federal workers, and made hundreds of recommendations to Clinton and Gore, some of which they accepted, some they didn’t”, said David Osborne, an adviser to the Clinton-era review that preceded the buyouts.
The status and legality of Trump’s programme remains unclear. A federal judge in Massachusetts stifled the administration’s February 6 deadline for employees to accept the offer, forcing a hearing on February 10.
Unions at Federal  sued, contending that the administration “has offered no statutory basis for its unprecedented offer.” The lawsuit asks whether the federal government will honor its commitment to pay participants through September 30.
As of February 5, the US Office of Personnel Management reported that 40, 000 employees had accepted the offer.
Under Clinton, buyouts were the result of a congressional review and act.
In a few weeks of his presidency, Clinton issued an executive order mandating that all government departments and organizations with more than 100 employees cut at least 4% of their civilian positions over the course of three years through attrition or “early out programmes” in an , executive order.
Congress paved the way for buyouts. The Federal Workforce Restructuring Act of 1994, HR 3345, was signed by Clinton in March 1994. The legislation passed by wide, bipartisan margins: 391-17 in the House and 99-1 in the Senate.
Except for those employed by the Department of Defense, Central Intelligence Agency, or the General Accounting Office (now known as the Government Accountability Office), the legislation authorized buyouts of up to $25, 000 for some groups of executive and judicial branch employees. The law set an April 1, 1995, deadline.
Clinton said the plan would enable the “reduction of employment” by 273, 000 people by the end of 1999.
“After all the rhetoric about cutting the size and cost of Government, our administration has done the hard work and made the tough choices”, Clinton said in a , statement.  , “I believe the economy will be stronger, and the lives of middle class people will be better, as we drive down the deficit with legislation like this”.
The legislation was a result of Clinton’s National Performance Review, which was launched in March 1993 with the slogan “Make Government Work Better and Cost Less.” Al Gore, vice president, was chosen to lead the review and prepare a report in six months, according to Clinton.
The review was led by about 250 career civil servants who collaborated with agency employees to make recommendations.
Not everyone agreed with the Clinton-Gore initiative.
“There was opposition”, but union leaders supported reducing the power of middle managers, the target of most of the reductions, and the increased role of unions in bargaining, “so they felt this was an acceptable trade-off”, John M Kamensky, National Performance Review deputy director, told PolitiFact.
Gore visited “federal offices for what are billed as “town meetings,” which are more like group therapy sessions where employees can express their feelings about their jobs,” according to The Chicago Tribune in June 1993.
Gore’s September 1993 report made hundreds of recommendations including buyouts. Gore went on , David Letterman’s late-night television show , to promote the plan.
“So, have you fixed the government”? Letterman asked.
Gore remarked, “We found a lot of really ridiculous things that cost way too much.”
Gore studied federal regulations regarding how ashtrays must break when dropped while reading about government-purchased ashtrays. Wearing safety goggles, Gore cracked the ashtray with a hammer.
Clinton had a “very deep commitment to change, but it was not hostile”, Paul Light, New York University professor emeritus of public service, said.
Clinton’s effort to reduce the federal workforce stemmed from his campaign platform as a “new Democrat” who said the era of big government was over, said Elaine Kamarck, who helped lead the Clinton-Gore review and is now director of the Brookings Institution’s Centre for Effective Public Management.
According to Kamarck, “We had a tech revolution going on that did not require as many levels of management as the old days.”
How the Trump administration wants to reduce employment
Which employees could be let go without compromising the government’s overall mission was the Clinton approach’s goal of being surgical in determining which ones could be.
The Trump approach, so far, involves buyouts and firings, without a review period or congressional action. The Office of Personnel Management sent a message to federal employees about the “fork in the road” on January 28. (Elon Musk, who heads Trump’s new Department of Government Efficiency, used the same phrase in an all-staff message in 2022 after buying Twitter.)
The email also stated that remote workers had to resume work five days per week and that it had “deferred resignation.” Employees had until February 6 to resign and receive payment through September 30 (up until the court intervention on February 6). The email hinted that layoffs were possible.
The offer was made to about two million employees. The civilian federal workforce is about 2.4 million, setting aside US Postal Service workers, according to the Pew Research Center. The average annual pay is about $106, 000.
Some workers were , exempt , from the offers, including the military, Postal Service employees and workers in immigration enforcement, national security and public safety.
Trump’s programme is more generous than Clinton’s, Rachel Greszler, a senior research fellow at the Heritage Foundation, a conservative think tank, told PolitiFact. Clinton’s $25, 000 offer is about $55, 000 in today’s dollars. Trump’s plan says it will pay people over about eight months, so factoring in the average federal worker salary, that’s higher.
Democratic attorneys general urged unionized workers to follow the advice of their union representatives, citing the possibility that the payments may not be guaranteed. Democratic senators raised similar concerns about the short window , for employees to decide and , Trump’s authority , to do this.
Another subject of lawsuits is Trump’s decision to reclassify workers so he can fire them sooner. Employees were given paid leave after receiving an order to end federal diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) programs.
A reporter inquired about the program’s potential to remove members of the government who disagree with the president.
“That’s absolutely false”, Leavitt said. Federal employees should be told to go back to work by this suggestion. And if they don’t, then they have the option to resign. And this administration has generously offered to pay them for eight months.
