Ex-Federal Workers Mount Congress Bids in Rebuke to Trump Agenda

President Donald Trump’s aggressive federal bureaucracy overhaul has spawned a new type of Congressional candidate: former government employees who want voters to send them back to Washington to fix what they say the administration has broken.

Dozens of former federal workers declared for House races, mostly as Democrats, after retiring, resigning, or getting pushed out of their job over the last year and a half. Some are running for open seats, while others are primarying well-entrenched incumbents. One, former Justice Department prosecutor Zach Dembo of Kentucky, already won a primary.

The civil servants turned politicians tout their behind-the-scenes experience and first-hand knowledge of government’s workings. Some have even shaped their platforms around rebuking Trump, essentially flipping the president’s own “Drain the Swamp” messaging back on his own administration.

“We’re like this weirdo corny group of people that just believe when you take an oath you keep it and that’s what’s needed on a higher level,” said Karen Ortiz, a former Equal Employment Opportunity Commission administrative law judge running as an independent in New York’s 12th District.

Ortiz is among the candidates who had high-profile exits from the government. She was fired after sending an email to the EEOC chair and 1,000 coworkers calling the agency’s abandonment of transgender bias cases “illegal and unconstitutional.” Another candidate, former Department of Homeland Security attorney Julie T. Le, was taken off of a DOJ detail after she told a federal judge “this system sucks, this job sucks” in response to questioning about ICE operations.

Other ex-feds vying for Congress say they voluntarily left their role rather than carry out Trump’s policies, while at least one candidate, Michael Duffin, was fired as part of the Department of Government Efficiency’s mass layoffs. The former State Department employee promised to help reinstate federal workers if elected in Virginia’s 8th District.

“Most of them I’m sure are mad,” said Elaine Kamarck, a senior fellow in governance studies at Brookings, about former federal workers. “Mad at the carelessness with which DOGE went about this work. Mad at being demonized when they were doing jobs that they thought helped the American people.”

Ex-federal workers hoping to run against Trump’s policies may be able to take advantage of the president’s flagging second-term approval ratings, but they’ll also have to overcome voters’ dim views of the federal government itself.

Speaking Out

Several federal workers’ campaign ads and websites emphasize an idealistic view of government service and strong opposition to how Trump is remaking Washington.

Le, who is challenging Rep. Ilhan Omar in the Democratic primary for Minnesota’s 5th District, said she has no regrets about her response in open court when asked about ICE violating court orders. Le said she was simply telling the truth about what she saw after volunteering to help the US attorney’s office in Minnesota work on habeas cases during immigration crackdowns, at one point handling more than 85 on her own.

“Looking back, that was the moment my life as a refugee, my career as a lawyer, and my future as a candidate all came together,” Le said in an email. “I learned that some systems can’t be fixed from the inside. They have to be fixed at the policy level.”

Ortiz said she wouldn’t have been able to live with herself without speaking in response to the administration’s shifts on civil rights law enforcement for LGBTQ+ workers, even if it meant risking her “dream job.” Her platform calls for articles of impeachment against Trump “on Day One.”

Ortiz faces tough odds to win retiring Rep. Jerry Nadler’s Manhattan seat. She’s a largely self-funded independent candidate running to the left of a crowded field of Democratic candidates who have each raised millions.

But like other federal workers, Ortiz brings inside experience of seeing the government function, said Keira Havens, co-founder of Courage for Democracy, a political action committee that supports her candidacy.

“It’s really easy to yell from the outside, ‘drain the swamp,’ and not understand how it works,” said Havens.

Michael Bloomberg donated $5 million to a super-PAC supporting one of the Democratic NY-12 candidates, Micah Lasher, who is a former aide. Bloomberg Law is operated by entities controlled by Michael Bloomberg.

Photo courtesy of Karen Ortiz

Amateur Challenges

“Amateur” candidates, or first-time office seekers, generally don’t perform well, but former federal workers may fare better this year, said Rachel Porter, an assistant professor of political science at the University of Notre Dame.

She likened it to the wave of female candidates elected in 2018 in backlash to derogatory comments Trump made about women, or doctors successful after Covid-19. A record-breaking 120 women were elected to Congress in 2018, according to the Women’s Congressional Policy Institute, including “Squad” members Omar, Ayanna Pressley (Mass.), Rashida Tlaib (Mich.), and Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (NY).

Dembo’s May 19 primary win in Kentucky’s 6th District was an early positive sign. Dembo says he resigned from the Justice Department because he couldn’t stomach the agency’s use as “President Trump’s personal law firm,” and is campaigning on eliminating Trump administration corruption.

Explicitly anti-Trump platforms could perform well for candidates in the midterms, since independents are nearly as unhappy with Trump as Democrats, Kamarck said.

But candidates will need to show how they can both “prosecute the case against Trump,” and come across as an effective leader who can also take on Congress and “fix things,” she said.

Dembo’s service as a federal prosecutor and in the Navy tested “very strongly” with independent voters in polling that predicts he’d outperform other Democrats in the general election.

“In order to truly change the corruption in DC, you don’t need yet another ambitious career politician, you need a corruption prosecutor who’s a political newcomer and won’t sell out his constituents based on party or politics,” Dembo said in an email. “The people of Central Kentucky want, and frankly deserve, someone with a long history of public service who’s in it for the right reasons.”

Dembo still faces an uphill electoral battle in a district Trump won by 15 points in 2024, which is currently rated as “solid Republican” by The Cook Political Report. The seat has been occupied for over a decade by Republican Andy Barr, who is running for Senate.

Nancy Lacore, a navy admiral fired by Secretary of War Pete Hegseth in a purge of senior military officials, is also emphasizing a record of public service in her run for a seat being vacated by Rep. Nancy Mace in South Carolina. Lacore recently advanced to a runoff in the Democratic primary.

At least two former federal workers have entered Congressional races as Republicans after recently leaving the government.

Star Black, who retired from the Federal Emergency Management Agency, is running in Georgia’s 14th District on a platform that includes calls for term limits and a ban on stock trading by members of Congress. Jorge Malavet, a Navy veteran who held roles at both DHS and the Agriculture Department, is among the Republicans running in Florida’s 9th, a seat currently held by Democratic Rep. Darren Soto.

Swing Districts

Some of the candidates will cut their political teeth in the handful of battleground elections that could decide who controls the House.

Eric Chung is running in the Democratic primary for Michigan’s 10th District, after quitting his job as a senior lawyer at the US Department of Commerce, where he had been overseeing implementation of the CHIPS and Science Act.

Eric Chung

Photo courtesy of Eric Chung

He decided to run for office to stand up for the US Constitution and his community near Detroit, which he said was hurt by Trump’s tariffs.

“This is a moment in time when we need new members of Congress who can hit the ground running on day one. We don’t have time to waste to make sure that our Constitution is followed,” Chung said.

Chung led fundraising in his race as of March 31, bringing in $1.5 million, according to federal campaign records.

But association with federal government service could also have electoral downsides.

Trust in government is at one of its lowest points in seven decades, with just 17% of Americans saying they trust Washington to do what’s right “just about always” or “most of the time,” according to a 2025 Pew Research Poll.

Politicians decrying an untrustworthy “deep state” doesn’t help public perceptions of federal workers, said Jaime Lee Kucinskas, an associate professor in the Department of Sociology at Hamilton College.

But she said civil servants bring “not only their expertise about the many complex things the civil state does,” but also understand “why it’s important to do it with integrity, ethically, and with specific knowledge in the areas they’re working in.”