Federal Judge Rules DHS Plan to Cut FEMA Workforce in Half Was Unlawful

A federal judge has ruled that the Department of Homeland Security acted unlawfully when it directed the Federal Emergency Management Agency toward cutting its workforce roughly in half and took control of key personnel decisions.

U.S. District Judge Susan Illston of the Northern District of California granted labor groups partial summary judgment on September 11, finding that DHS improperly usurped FEMA’s authority and steered the agency toward a staffing target of about 11,500 employees, down from roughly 23,000.

The ruling is a significant legal rebuke to the administration’s effort to shrink FEMA, but it does not mean that half of the agency’s employees were fired. The court record and recent reporting indicate that the proposed 50% reduction was not ultimately completed as a single mass cut. FEMA did, however, lose thousands of employees through departures and other personnel actions, including the nonrenewal of some temporary workers.

The case centers on FEMA’s CORE employees — full-time temporary workers who support disaster response and recovery across emergencies. Historically, FEMA handled the renewal process for those employees. The court found that DHS began requiring additional justification for renewals and that some CORE workers whose terms expired early in 2026 were not renewed despite recommendations from their supervisors.

Congress created a legal barrier against precisely this kind of restructuring after Hurricane Katrina. The Post-Katrina Emergency Management Reform Act of 2006 established FEMA as a distinct entity within DHS, transferred FEMA’s functions and personnel to the agency, and prohibited the DHS secretary from substantially or significantly reducing FEMA’s authorities, responsibilities, functions or ability to carry out its mission.

Illston concluded that the staffing initiative violated the Administrative Procedure Act. The court also rejected the government’s effort to characterize the issue as merely an internal staffing choice. The judge’s ruling treated DHS’s direction over FEMA’s workforce as a substantive agency action governed by law, not simply an administrative preference.

That distinction matters because FEMA’s workforce is designed to expand and contract around disasters. Permanent employees provide continuity, while CORE workers and reservists supply specialized capacity for response and recovery operations. Cutting those layers may not be immediately visible to the public, but it can affect how quickly the agency processes aid, deploys personnel and manages long-running recovery efforts.

A Government Accountability Office report released this year found that more than 4,300 FEMA employees separated from the agency during the 2025 budget year, while the agency hired about 2,900. GAO said the departures resulted in a loss of institutional knowledge and experienced personnel and warned that FEMA could not be certain it was adequately positioned to meet mission demands without more strategic workforce planning.

The ruling therefore addresses two separate questions: whether the administration could pursue the half-size target in the manner it did, and what should happen to employees and agency operations after months of uncertainty. The judge answered the first question in favor of the unions. The second remains unresolved.

Illston did not impose a specific remedy or order the immediate reinstatement of all affected workers. Instead, she directed the parties to meet and confer about the scope of relief. Further proceedings will determine whether the government must restore particular personnel authorities, offer additional appointments, or take other steps to repair the effects of the unlawful actions.

For FEMA, the practical test will come outside the courtroom. The agency says it is maintaining a deployable force for the 2026 hurricane season and other emergencies. But the court ruling and the GAO’s findings suggest that the dispute is not only about headcount. It is also about whether disaster preparedness can be managed as a central government function while the agency responsible for it is being reorganized from above.