For decades now, the federal government has marketed itself as the employer of choice for military spouses, who are unemployed at five times the national rate despite being more educated than their civilian spouse counterparts.
Military spouses and their families move involuntarily every two to three years, on average. As a result, it’s not unusual for those who work in the federal government to frequently change positions or even organizations within their agencies.
Many are perpetually probationary employees — the category of worker the Trump administration targeted in its recent first round of firings.
Arielle Pines had proudly clocked 15 years working at the Department of Veterans Affairs when she was fired by email last week, despite years of exceptional performance reviews.
“It’s not just people who are new to the federal government,” she says, pushing back on a common misconception about probationary employees who are getting the boot.
“There are five of us [in my office] who moved over from other HR departments. We are military spouses, we are veterans, one with 18 years.”
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There aren’t many jobs out there for people with Ph. Ds who have a specialty in data analytics and move every few years.
But the CDC World Trade Center health program had one. Rachael was on the team that does research and provides services for people whose health was affected by breathing toxic air from the smoldering rubble of Ground Zero after the 9/11 attacks — first responders, workers and residents of lower Manhattan.
“I thought [the terminations] would be a methodical approach: figure out what’s needed, what’s not. But that is not what this is. Instead, it is just blanket firing of probationary employees because they have fewer rights without regard for their function.”