DoD hiring still mostly frozen, but these positions are exempt

The Defense Department’s hiring freeze isn’t ending anytime soon, but a recent policy memo clarifies which positions are still eligible to fill and how the military services can seek exemptions for those roles.

Special exemptions outlined by the Defense Department lets hiring continue for those “directly linked to building readiness and providing essential services,” including roles in child and youth programs, DoD schools and childcare center; positions that support installation fire and safety services; as well as positions at depots, shipyards, arsenals, medical treatment facilities and the Military Entrance Processing Command.

Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth ordered a near-total hiring freeze in February, following the Trump administration’s governmentwide directive to pause hiring in an effort to reduce the size of the federal government.

A senior official told reporters that the department is shrinking the civilian workforce by about 6,000 people per month with the help of the instituted hiring freeze. Hegseth said his goal is to shrink the size of the civilian workforce by up to 8%, or about 60,000 people, and the hiring freeze is just one method of doing it.

The initial memo instituting a hiring freeze prohibited filling vacant civilian positions or creating new positions unless approved by Hegseth. The Defense Secretary said he would “consider exemptions for positions essential to immigration enforcement, national security and public safety, and positions which support such functions,” in the initial memo. 

But DoD didn’t mention any occupation codes, or didn’t provide any further clarification about what positions the Pentagon considered important to national security. 

The new memo signed by Jules Hurst, the acting undersecretary of defense for personnel and readiness, provides a limited, but more comprehensive, list of who can still get a job at the Defense Department. 

Positions that are under the DoD’s Nonappropriated Fund umbrella, or those whose salaries are not appropriated by Congress, are exempt from the freeze. Additionally, employees who are in the middle of their permanent change of station (PCS) moves initiated prior to the freeze if those civilians are moving from less critical to more critical roles.

Hurst also said in the memo that positions related to immigration enforcement, national security, public safety, recruiting and readiness can be filled if civilian employees are exercising return rights from an overseas assignment; civilians hired as part of a reasonable accommodation, under the Rehabilitation Act of 1973; civilians covered by the Uniformed Services Employment and Reemployment Rights Act; and civilians returning to duty after receiving workers’ compensation under the Federal Employees’ Compensation Act.

Positions required to be filled by dual status military technicians — civilian employees who also serve in the National Guard or Reserve, and positions “required to be filled as directed by a court, arbitrator or administrative tribunal” or required to be “filled by law” are also exempted from the freeze.

Hurst also included positions that directly support the president, positions requiring Presidential appointment or Senate confirmation in this memo. 

It is unclear how long the Defense Department’s hiring freeze will be in place —  while President Donald Trump ordered a 90-day governmentwide hiring freeze on his first day in office, some agencies, including the General Services Administration are extending their freezes through 2025. 

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