Ex-feds join forces to reimagine government post-Trump

A group of former federal employees is developing plans to rebuild the civil service after President Donald Trump leaves office. Their mission, however, is not simply to reverse ongoing agency cuts, but rather to reenvision decades-old government workforce management policies. 

“I think, so far, there has not been evidence that the current administration is looking to make government function better,” said Kyleigh Russ, the director of the Democracy Works 250 initiative. “So we will look for an opportunity to do this work and have it ready to be deployed when we have a moment to say ‘We're ready to actually make government deliver in transformative ways that have been waiting for a long time to see the light of day.’”

Democracy Works 250 is a program under Democracy Forward, a nonprofit that is behind many of the lawsuits against the Trump administration. The initiative, which launched on Nov. 13, is focused on improving governmental functions. 

The program will be supported by the Civil Service Defense and Innovation Fellows, a cohort of 14 former feds who have been tasked with identifying the impacts of federal workforce cuts in certain policy areas (e.g. education, science) and creating proposals to better agency operations. 

“They will document what has happened in their policy areas and agencies and then they will move on to ‘Okay, what does that actually mean for Americans? How will Americans experience the cuts or the shakeups or whatever has happened in their policy areas?’” Russ said. “Then, they will pivot to ‘Now what?’ If this is where we are, what does the path to reform — and reimagining agencies and policy areas — actually look like?”  

Russ said that the fellows will also assist with Democracy Works 250’s broader efforts on federal personnel policy and strategic workforce management. 

“This is not the sexy policy stuff that people get excited about, that candidates get excited about, that elected officials get excited about, but it is so essential to the federal government's ability to deliver for the American people,” said Rob Shriver, former acting director of the Office of Personnel Management under Biden and managing director of Democracy Forward’s Civil Service Strong and Good Government Initiatives. “It's been neglected. It's been under-resourced and all of the cracks in the foundation have now been publicly exploited by the Trump administration.” 

Under the goal of improving government efficiency, the president has removed swaths of the federal workforce and sought to make it easier to fire some civil servants. 

Since 2001, strategic human capital management has been on the Government Accountability Office’s high-risk list of federal programs that are at risk of waste, fraud, abuse, mismanagement or in need of transformation. Specifically, the watchdog has urged agencies to “address skills gaps” by “improving workforce planning, training and recruitment and retention efforts.” 

“This is really the moment to take a step back and take a fresh look at the infrastructure and the functions that are so critical to every agency in getting stuff done,” Shriver said. “Because if we don't do that, you can have the greatest policy ideas ever and the greatest plans for how you're going to reform things, and it doesn't get to the finish line. It doesn't have the impact that you think it's going to have, because that infrastructure is clogged up with stuff that needs to be taken care of.”

The Civil Service Defense and Innovation Fellows include: 

• Mary Comans, who served as the Federal Emergency Management Agency’s chief financial officer from 2017 to 2025. 
• Karen Hacker, who was the director of the National Center for Chronic Disease Prevention and Health Promotion at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. 
• Angelica Quirarte, who most recently was the senior advisor for talent strategy and service delivery at the Office of Management and Budget. 

“A lot of these folks have been through some really tough times after a long and distinguished career in the federal government,” Shriver said. “I'm excited that we're able to bring them together in a cohort to work through personally what they've been through and also feel like they're part of something bigger again — like federal workers always feel about their jobs.”