Is the Government Shutdown a Trap for Democrats?

[Mystic Wanderer]

Is a RIF, a reduction in Force, what President Trump had in mind from the beginning? If so, it shows his pure genius yet again. He's always 5 steps ahead of them.  

Has President Trump suckered Democrats and the Deep State into a trap that will enable a radical downsizing of the federal bureaucracy?  In only five more days of the already "longest government shutdown in history" (25 days and counting, as of today), a heretofore obscure threshold will be reached, enabling permanent layoffs of bureaucrats furloughed 30 days or more.

Don't believe me that federal bureaucrats can be laid off?  Well, in bureaucratese, a layoff is called a RIF – a Reduction in Force – and of course, it comes with a slew of civil service protections.  But, if the guidelines are followed, bureaucrats can be laid off – as in no more job.  It is all explained by Michael Roberts here (updated after the beginning of the partial shutdown):

A reduction in force is a thoughtful and systematic elimination of positions.  For all practical purposes, a government RIF is the same thing as a layoff. ...
Organizations must stick to predetermined criteria when sorting out what happens to each employee.  They must communicate with employees how and why decisions are made. ...
In deciding who stays and who goes, federal agencies must take four factors into account:
1.    Tenure
2.    Veteran status
3.    Total federal civilian and military service
4.    Performance
Agencies cannot use RIF procedures to fire bad employees. 

A lot of procedures must be followed, and merit ("performance") is the last consideration, but based on the criteria above, employees already furloughed can be laid off ("RIFed") once they have been furloughed for 30 days or 22 work days:

When agencies furlough employees for more than 30 calendar days or 22 discontinuous work days, they must use RIF procedures.
An employee can be terminated or moved into an available position[.]

This seems to be what was referenced in this remarkable essay written by an "unidentified senior Trump official" published in the Daily Caller, which vouches for the authenticity of the author and explains that it is protecting him from adverse career consequences should the name become known.  I strongly recommend reading the whole thing.

The purported senior official makes the case that devotion to "process" eats up most of the time of federal bureaucrats and is also used by enemies of President Trump's initiatives to stymie the legitimate orders issued by his senior officials:

On an average day, roughly 15 percent of the employees around me are exceptional patriots serving their country.  I wish I could give competitive salaries to them and no one else.  But 80 percent feel no pressure to produce results.  If they don't feel like doing what they are told, they don't.
Why would they?  We can't fire them.  They avoid attention, plan their weekend, schedule vacation, their second job, their next position – some do this in the same position for more than a decade.
They do nothing that warrants punishment and nothing of external value.  That is their workday: errands for the sake of errands – administering, refining, following and collaborating on process.  "Process is your friend" is what delusional civil servants tell themselves.  Even senior officials must gain approval from every rank across their department, other agencies and work units for basic administrative chores.

Then the senior official notes what I have just called the "trap":

Most of my career colleagues actively work against the president's agenda.  This means I typically spend about 15 percent of my time on the president's agenda and 85 percent of my time trying to stop sabotage, and we have no power to get rid of them.  Until the shutdown.

Those officials who waste time and stymie the president's initiatives now are not present because they are not categorized as "essential."

Due to the lack of funding, many federal agencies are now operating more effectively from the top down on a fraction of their workforce, with only select essential personnel serving national security tasks. ...
President Trump can end this abuse.  Senior officials can reprioritize during an extended shutdown, focus on valuable results and weed out the saboteurs.  We do not want most employees to return, because we are working better without them.

Keep in mind that saboteurs cannot be individually identified and RIFed, but they can be included in the layoffs if they meet the criteria above in terms of seniority and service, and they must be given 60 days' notice.  But once they are gone, they are no longer free to obstruct using the "process" as their friend, because they are gone.

You can expect lawsuits on every conceivable point, and I suspect that the definition of "furlough" will be one matter of dispute.
If this was the plan all along, it would explain why President Trump goaded Chuck and Nancy in his televised meeting with them last year, boasting that he would claim credit for the shutdown.  How could they resist a prolonged shutdown when he made it so easy to blame him?
President Trump has proven that he is a "disruptor" who changes the framework of thinking on major issues by refusing to accept the "givens" – the assumptions of how things always have been done and therefore always must be done.

Read the full article here:  Source

[Armonica_Templar]

This makes sense

It is quiet and is legal

I am like holy crap

If it works how small will this make the government?

[Mystic Wanderer]

This makes sense

It is quiet and is legal

I am like holy crap

If it works how small will this make the government?

I'm hoping this is what's happening. A lot of people were making videos about it yesterday and got very excited.  Either way, Americans win...
The Dems either don't come back in 5 days, and a lot of them get RIFed, or they do come back and we get the wall.  President Trump said he would keep it shut down until they agreed to a wall. 

BOOM!

[guohua]

Yes this could work for the Bloated Agencies, USDA, National Park Serv. Department of Agriculture and the Federal Transportation Office, but the essential agencies that are the Federal Law Enforcement Branches won't be touched, they are still working.

But do you remember back about 8 months or a year ago when President Trump wanted to make it easier for all Agencies to be able to Fire The Dead Weight/Lazy employees they were stuck hiring under Obama.
This maybe the way! 

[Mystic Wanderer]

Well, I have some bad news.  Dilley got an email from someone in the White House saying there are two different types of shutdowns, and only one makes RIFs available.  And, it's not this one.    

There is an administration shutdown, and the one we have now.  The administration shutdown is where people can be fired.

Everyone on Twitter was so excited thinking some of the swamp was about to go down the drain. I suppose someone in the WH needed to put out the fire before it went viral that people would be leaving.  They watch Dilley's show.  He was the first person I heard talking about the RIFs, and that keeping this shutdown going could be so they could fire some  people.

Dilley talks about it at the 15:52 mark: