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Cozy Sharke's avatar

Allison, is the Hatch Act generally considered too toothless to be of strategic use here, even if just to slow them down? I suspect many of these actions, beginning with the aggressively partisan rhetoric in the DEIA memo, have been or will be clear violations of that federal law.

Thank you for continuing to assimilate and share what you're hearing across agencies for us - it's a great service to us in the federal work force.

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Chris Ligatti's avatar

Hatch Act doesn’t have real penalties that would dissuade anyone and the law won’t apply to any of these actions. The spirit of the Hatch Act, sure- patronage bad, but the Act itself is focused on campaigning and candidate support, not civil service actions. The language of the statute is more concerned with a letter carrier making a political donation on his private phone while on official time.

And it can even be used to support what’s currently happening- remember the first administration where fed employees were advised that the words resist and resistance shouldn’t be used around the workplace as they could be Hatch Act violations? There are other federal laws that give me some hope in terms of litigation, but the Hatch Act ain’t one of them.

As Kellyanne Conway said with no repercussions when asked by a reporter about her Hatch Act violations, “blah, blah, blah…”

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Cozy Sharke's avatar

Yeah, thanks. I had forgotten about that Conway episode. Your opinion about Hatch Act seems more or less consistent with a Government Ethics attorney's reply to my inquiry this morning. Frustrating how inadequate the law has been in safeguarding us from these insidious abuses of power.

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