With Trump now impeached and the subject of a Senate trial, a union representing federal employees says that the controversial legal guidance from the Office of Special Counsel (OSC) tramples on workers’ First Amendment rights. The union argues that the OSC, an independent agency now headed by a Trump appointee, has misread the Hatch Act in a way that’s created a “chilling effect” among federal employees. Impeachment is “all that’s in the news,” Ward Morrow, AFGE’s assistant general counsel, told HuffPost. Generally speaking, the Hatch Act, which dates to 1939, forbids most federal workers from engaging in electoral politics while on the clock or in their official capacity. The restrictions tend to boil down to advancing a candidate or party, and that’s where AFGE said the OSC misses the mark.

Source: Huffington Post January 28, 2020 00:11 UTC