'Canary in the coal mine': Writer says Dems face first battle for federal government

One of the key features of tech billionaires Elon Musk and Vivek Ramaswamy's "Department of Government Efficiency" task force is to fire thousands of federal workers — something Ramaswamy has even gone so far as to say can be good for them.

This is an issue on which Democrats should plant a clear flag, and fight for a group of people who for decades have lacked a voice, wrote Bryan Williams for Salon.

"The reality of how federal workers are and have been treated should be a focal point for a defeated and disorganized left, whether among the moderates blaming the far left or among those who agree with Bernie Sanders that party leadership has lost touch with workers," wrote Williams. "The fight for federal workers is the first battle in the upcoming assault on the federal government. The left would be wise to use a full-throated defense of federal workers as an opportunity to portray Donald Trump, Musk, Ramaswamy and the entire GOP as cruel and unconcerned with actual working people."

Trump has been planning an assault on federal workers' rights far longer than he was involved with Musk — stripping federal workers of merit protection was one of his last policies before leaving office, and it was a key plank of the Heritage Foundation's Project 2025 plans.

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"One notable aspect of the ongoing discussions of the so-called Department of Government Efficiency is the dearth of actual federal workers amongst those discussing the matter," Williams wrote. "As an employee of the Bureau of Economic Analysis for over 15 years, ending in March 2022, I can tell you the situation has gotten steadily worse for decades. Federal workers are underpaid, mistreated and lack the voice in society to fight back. And they’ve proven to be the proverbial canary in the coal mine."

The truth is, the number of federal workers has declined as a share of the overall workforce since 1982, noted Williams — and for three decades their wages have not kept pace with wages in the private sector. They're far from the bloated bureaucracy they're portrayed as, he argued — they're underappreciated servants of the public who keep the wheels of government turning. And yet even Democrats have often slashed the federal workforce.

"Of the 2.3 million federal workers tallied by FedScope Federal Workforce Database (which excludes Postal employees, intelligence agencies, and a few very small agencies), over 750,000 work for the Departments of Defense. Another half million work in the Veterans Administration and over 200,000 work for the Department of Homeland Security," Williams wrote. "That leaves only about 800,000 for every other major function of the federal government, from tax collection to maintaining our national parks, to safeguarding our nuclear systems, administering Pell Grants, and prosecuting criminals."

The fact is, Williams concluded, "Resisting the DOGE commission must be the next step in Democrats showing they’re a workers’ party, like they say they are."