Federal Judge Temporarily Blocks OPM Essay Asking Applicants About Trump Orders

A federal judge in Massachusetts has temporarily blocked the Office of Personnel Management from requiring one disputed essay question on federal job applications, pausing its use across the government while a legal challenge moves forward.

The question, known in the case as “Question Three,” asked applicants to identify one or two Trump executive orders or policy initiatives that were significant to them and explain how they would help implement them in the job. The lawsuit was brought by the American Federation of Government Employees, the American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees, and the National Association of Government Employees against OPM Director Scott Kupor, OPM and the United States. The unions filed the case on Nov. 6, 2025.

In a Sept. 11 opinion and order, U.S. District Judge George A. O’Toole Jr. of the District of Massachusetts granted part of the unions’ request for relief and stayed the use of that question. The ruling is preliminary, not a final decision on the full lawsuit. O’Toole said the unions were likely to succeed on their claim under the Administrative Procedure Act, with his reasoning focused on likely First Amendment problems, including compelled or chilled speech and viewpoint concerns. He also found the other factors for temporary relief — irreparable harm, the balance of equities and the public interest — favored a stay. But he did not grant all the relief the unions sought, denying a broader preliminary injunction that would have barred agencies from relying on answers already submitted because, he said, the plaintiffs lacked standing for that remedy.

The disputed prompt came from a broader Merit Hiring Plan issued by OPM and the White House Domestic Policy Council on May 29, 2025, to implement Executive Order 14170, signed Jan. 20, 2025. That plan directed agencies to add four short free-response essay questions to competitive-service job announcements at the GS-05 level and above, with some exceptions. O’Toole’s order blocks only the third question, not the entire hiring plan.

The dispute touches a basic principle of the federal civil service: routine career hiring is supposed to be governed by merit-system rules designed to keep it nonpartisan, rather than conditioned on political loyalty. This case, however, is narrowly about one hiring question within a broader federal hiring overhaul, not all federal hiring procedures.

According to the unions’ complaint, the question had appeared on more than 5,800 job postings as of Nov. 6, 2025. The filings cited openings including air-traffic-control specialist, crane operator, nuclear materials courier and meat-cutting worker. OPM’s public guidance said the essay responses were optional and not scored, and that the hiring plan “prohibits any ideological litmus tests.” The unions argued that in practice some postings were configured so applicants could not move forward without answering, turning the prompt into a political screen.

AFGE National President Everett Kelley said, “Requiring federal job applicants to answer politically motivated questions goes against the very nature of the nonpartisan civil service, and we are pleased the judge has put an immediate stop to the administration’s loyalty questions.”

In a follow-up order, the judge directed Kupor to notify all agency heads or acting agency heads within seven days that Question Three is stayed and to file a status report within 14 days describing what steps OPM took to comply. The stay remains in effect until further order of the court.