WASHINGTON, D.C. – America First Legal (AFL) and Boyden Gray PLLC have moved on behalf of American Moment and Feds for Freedom to intervene in a lawsuit in the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia seeking to overturn a 44-year-old consent decree prohibiting the federal government from using a merit-based written exam to hire federal workers.
In 1981, during the final days of the Carter Administration, the Office of Personnel Management (OPM) entered into the Luevano consent decree, which ended the federal government’s use of a standardized written aptitude test to enter federal service. Since then, OPM has failed to identify any test that complies with the consent decree’s race-based requirements.
Under President Trump, OPM asked the court to dissolve the consent decree, arguing that it discriminates based on race in violation of the U.S. Constitution and Title VII of the Civil Rights Act.
AFL’s motion supports OPM’s position and seeks to intervene in the case. It argues that the consent decree has long violated federal law by requiring the government to consider race when designing tests to use in staffing the civil service. It also conflicts with U.S. Supreme Court precedent, most notably Students for Fair Admissions v. Harvard.
“Public service is a public trust. Presidential administrations from both parties have long advocated ending unaccountable bureaucracies that fail to do a good turn for the American people,” said Dan Epstein, America First Legal Vice President. “Being able to recruit the best and brightest to work in Washington returns dividends for the country by doing more with less. That is what all Americans deserve from their government.”
“The Luevano consent decree imposes a virtually impossible standard to create a broadly used merit-based civil service exam,” said Nick Barry, America First Legal Senior Counsel. “America is missing out on recruiting high-quality talent because of an illegal, 44-year-old consent decree. The consent decree illegally discriminates on the basis of race and should be dissolved. We must move back to merit-based evaluations. Race, color, and other immutable characteristics have no place in that evaluation.”
AFL is proud to represent American Moment and Feds for Freedom as the coalition works to end race-based discrimination in federal hiring, uphold the rule of law, and return to a merit-based system for staffing the civil service.
Read the motion here.
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