IRS: 7,000 probationary workers will return to their jobs in next 10 days

About 7,000 probationary IRS workers who lost their jobs in February and were placed on administrative leave in March will return to work later this month, according to an email they received Tuesday.

“You are receiving this email as one of approximately 7,000 probationary employees who were separated from service and have been reinstated in compliance with recent court orders,” the email read. “At this time, while you remain on administrative leave, you will soon receive instructions for how to return to full-time duty by April 14.”

Under court orders, the IRS had previously reinstated the workers by placing them on administrative leave, according to an email the workers received in mid-March. A federal judge – one of two who issued rehire orders for probationary employees who worked at the IRS and other government agencies – said that decision did not meet the terms of his bench order and said the employees must go to work.

That bench order, which covered six federal agencies including Treasury, came in American Federation of Government Employees, AFL-CIO et al v. United States Office of Personnel Management et al, No.3:25-cv-01780-WHA (N.D. Cal. 3/13/25).

Placing employees on administrative leave was not permitted by the court’s injunction, the judge wrote.

“The Court has read news reports that, in at least one agency, probationary employees are being rehired but then placed on administrative leave en masse,” the order said. “This is not allowed by the preliminary injunction, for it would not restore the services the preliminary injunction intends to restore.”

The other order came in State of Maryland et al v. United States Department of Agriculture et al, No. 1:25-CV-00748 (Md. 3/13/25). Earlier this week, the judge in that case narrowed his nationwide reinstatement of probationary employees in 17 agencies to apply to those who work or live in 19 states and Washington, D.C. He also ordered reports by 2 p.m. Tuesday on the status of the rehire process.

The most recent IRS email directed workers to an internal website with details that include how benefits will be restored. They will receive “workspace assignments and temporary telework where space is not available,” the email said.

“I’m just riding the government roller coaster right now,” said Kelli McGlothlin of St. Joseph, Mo., who was fired Feb. 20 from her job as a tax clerk for collections in Kansas City, Mo.

McGlothlin, who was three weeks shy of ending her probationary term when she lost her job, said she was told that her record was wiped clean and she’s now a permanent employee.

Between job terminations and retirements, 12 tax clerks are working in her group that previously had 30 clerks, she said.

“Tax examiners are waiting for work,” she told the JofA on Wednesday. “The 12 clerks can’t get the work to the tax examiners quickly enough.”

The IRS email sent Tuesday did not mention the likelihood of any reduction-in-force (RIF) as the one in mid-March did. In that one, acting IRS Commissioner Melanie Krause said the agency had not yet received an RIF and reorganization plan from Treasury.

A friend asked McGlothlin what she would do if she lost her IRS job later as the result of a RIF. Her response: “We’ll have to ride that one when we get there. I’m taking it day by day.”

— To comment on this article or to suggest an idea for another article, contact Martha Waggoner at Martha.Waggoner@aicpa-cima.com.