OPM’s Kupor defends Schedule Policy/Career, as finalization nears

As the Trump administration’s Schedule Policy/Career nears finalization, Office of Personnel Management Director Scott Kupor reaffirmed his view that the pending personnel change is centered on “accountability,” rather than politicization.

The OPM director pushed back against criticisms from the federal community, after many warned of a return to a patronage system in the career civil service if the new federal employment classification is finalized.

“I think most federal employees know this — and certainly all the ones I’ve encountered have had no problem with this — your job is ultimately to effect lawful actions that the president determines are the appropriate objectives for the organization,” Kupor said during a March 5 event hosted by Federal News Network. “That’s what this does — basically codify what essentially has always been the practice of the executive branch.”

Tens of thousands of federal employees are on track to soon be converted to the new Schedule Policy/Career category, leaving them with limited appeal rights and making it easier for agencies to fire them. But once the policy takes effect, aside from receiving notification of the reclassification, Kupor said “nothing else happens” for career federal employees.

“Now you’re under a different designation, and business will be as usual,” Kupor said.

“But if any of those individuals ultimately determines that they’re unwilling or uninterested in pursuing the policies of the administration … then they potentially could be removed by people in that organization,” he added.

OPM’s Feb. 6 final rule details many of the changes that career employees in “policy-influencing” positions would see as a result of their reclassification. When it comes to whistleblower policy, for instance, affected employees would be subject to an internal agency process rather than going to the independent Office of Special Counsel. Reclassified employees would also lose eligibility for recruitment, retention and relocation pay incentives, as well as student loan repayment options.

All told, many in the federal community have raised concerns of a “chilling effect” on the career civil service and an erosion of the non-partisan nature of the workforce — ultimately leading to deteriorating federal services and a loss of expertise at agencies.

Kupor, however, emphasized the importance of career employees adhering to the president’s policies.

“In all the interactions I’ve had with federal employees, they recognize and understand that every four years, for better or worse, whether they like it or not, whether they voted for this president or they didn’t, their job is ultimately to effect the policies of that administration,” he said. “If somebody says, ‘I have such a discordant view of what the president is doing that I literally am going to direct my people not to do what the president has lawfully instructed us to do,’ then I think it’s totally reasonable for the American people that that person should not be in the organization.”

About 94% of public comments OPM received on its regulations for Schedule Policy/Career were opposed to the administration’s proposed change. Just about 5% of commenters supported the policy, and 1% were neutral or mixed, according to OPM’s own analysis.

“We’re not saying don’t disagree with the president — everybody has the right to do that,” Kupor said, when asked about his response to the criticisms. “What we’re saying is, if your disagreement then causes you to not fulfill your duties as an employee of the American people and do the things that the lawfully elected president has asked you to do, then, quite frankly, in my mind, the honorable thing to do is either resign from that position, or potentially face removal if you’re in this Policy/Career position.”

Performance system changes ahead

At the same time, OPM has also been pushing forward other efforts to alter personnel policy for the career federal workforce — including through a recent proposal to change the government’s performance management system.

In February, OPM proposed regulations to remove a current ban on a forced distribution system — something that could eventually lead to agencies limiting how many federal employees can be rated as high performers in their annual performance evaluations.

Kupor said the pending changes come back to what he sees as inflation of performance ratings across the federal workforce. He pointed to 2013 data from the Government Accountability Office, showing that the vast majority of federal employees were rated as performing at or above expectations in their reviews, while just about 0.3% were rated “below expectations.”

“I just have a hard time believing that accurately reflects what the performance of the organization is,” Kupor said. “It creates, in my mind, very, very perverse incentives, and the absence of what I think we would want to have in any environment, which is a high-performance culture.”

For federal employees who are considered “poor performers” in government, Kupor said agencies should try to “rehabilitate” them, by providing feedback and putting them on performance improvement plans.

“But in some cases, those people may ultimately, unfortunately, have to be removed from their organization in the federal government,” Kupor said. “If somebody actually is not capable of doing what we need them to do, a manager needs the ability to remove that person.”

Relatedly, Kupor said OPM is also looking at regulatory changes to make it easier to remove federal employees who are rated as poor performers and deemed unable to improve.

“It’s extremely difficult, even for people who are not performing, to be removed from the organization,” he said. “It takes a very long time. It is a very long process.”

The Trump administration has already implemented limitations for performance ratings for career Senior Executive Service members and others in senior-level positions. OPM finalized regulations in September 2025 to remove a ban on forced distributions for SES performance evaluations, and put a 30% cap on the portion of senior executives who can be rated in the top two categories of the government’s performance rating scale. The regulations do not limit how many senior executives can be rated in the middle and lower tier categories.

Last year, the Trump administration also changed the performance criteria for senior executives, making adherence to the president’s policies the “most critical element” to be considered in their annual performance reviews.

Going forward, Kupor expressed interest in moving toward performance-based monetary incentives, by giving at least 60% of the funding set aside for employee bonuses to those who are rated in the top two tiers of the performance evaluation scale.

“We believe that if we have people who are truly outperforming, we ought to demonstrate that we value that outperformance by giving them compensation,” Kupor said. “If we create a high-performance culture, we can attract, retain and recruit people who truly want to be in a place where, when they do great work, that work is rewarded.”

If you would like to contact this reporter about recent changes in the federal government, please email drew.friedman@federalnewsnetwork.com or reach out on Signal at drewfriedman.11

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