Trump HR Chief Not Required to Testify for Coming Hearing (2)

Acting director of human resources Charles Ezell won’t have to testify on April 3 in the case challenging mass firings of government probationary employees, a federal judge ruled Friday.

“The deposition of defendant Ezell is, on the present record, premature,” Judge William Alsup of the US District Court for the Northern District of California said in his order.

Alsup stopped short of letting Ezell off the hook permanently, however. He denied the Department of Justice’s request to rid them of “any obligation to produce Mr. Ezell for any further deposition in this case,” adding that the plaintiffs may file a motion later in the case to seek to depose Ezell.

Earlier Friday, the Trump administration requested that Alsup block the testimony request. The public sector unions suing the Office of Personnel Management over its alleged directives to fire thousands of probationary workers in February wanted to depose Ezell on April 3.

“The testimony of Acting Director Ezell has scant additional evidentiary value,” the Department of Justice said in its filing before Judge William Alsup of the US District Court of the Northern District of California.

There are no “extraordinary circumstances” that require Ezell’s testimony, and a deposition would only distract him from his official duties, the DOJ argued.

“Compelling the testimony of an acting agency head poses major separation-of-powers concerns, especially at this early stage of litigation,” the motion said.

The judge had previously ordered Ezell to testify at an evidentiary hearing in San Francisco, but the DOJ withdrew his written legal declaration, making his testimony unnecessary for that hearing.

Alsup issued a preliminary injunction against the government earlier this month, requiring six federal agencies to rehire thousands of workers who were fired at the direction of OPM.

The lawsuit alleged that OPM initiated a private phone conference on Feb. 13 with the heads of several federal agencies where it directed them to prepare termination notices for probationary workers.

The unions took the deposition of OPM senior adviser Noah Peters on Wednesday, who said in a written declaration that Ezell was not on the Feb. 13 phone conference.

The DOJ’s Friday motion said the unions have already prepared depositions over six other individuals from non-OPM agencies “who were involved in the relevant communications and actions,” so Ezell’s testimony is unnecessary.

The motion asked that if the court denies a protective order of Ezell, it should delay his deposition by two weeks so the government can consider whether to seek relief from the US Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit.

Altshuler Berzon LLP and State Democracy Defenders Fund represent the plaintiffs. The US Department of Justice represents OPM.

The case is Am. Fed. of Gov’t Emp. AFL-CIO v. OPM, N.D. Cal., No. 3:25-cv-01780, 3/28/25.