SUPERIOR NATIONAL FOREST – What a mess.

After being fired for questionable reasons in February, approximately seven employees who work for the U.S. Forest Service on this massive swath of public land in northeastern Minnesota have been reinstated to work in three different ways this week.

Two judges – one in California and one Maryland – ruled Thursday, March 13 that the United States Department of Agriculture, which oversees the Forest Service, must reinstate thousands of probationary employees who were fired last month. Other agencies whose employees are affected by the ruling include the departments of Veterans Affairs, Defense, Energy, Interior and Treasury. There were an estimated 24,000 employees fired by the Trump administration last month in a sweeping overhaul of the federal government.

The Maryland judge who ruled late Thursday said previously fired federal employees need to be put back to work by Monday, March 17. The California judge, U.S. District Judge William Alsup, said performance reviews the federal government attempted to use to fire the employees last month were a sham.

“It is sad, a sad day when our government would fire some good employee, and say it was based on performance, when they know good and well, that’s a lie,” Alsup wrote.

Alsup’s ruling is being appealed by the Trump administration.

Paddle and Portage communicated with a federal employee who works near Lake Superior who said she was unjustly terminated based on a performance review. This missive was shared with employees of the Forest Service, including on Superior National Forest, the day the individual was terminated.

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The rulings from the judges in California and Maryland follow news from earlier in the week when the federal Merit Systems Protection Board agreed to temporarily reinstate its fired probationary employees. This includes Forest Service employees who were fired in recent weeks from Superior National Forest. The entire Boundary Waters Canoe Area Wilderness is located within Superior National Forest. Officials from the Forest Service told Paddle and Portage March 6 that fewer than 10 employees who work on Superior National Forest were fired as part of the Trump administration’s cuts to the federal workforce.

The order from last week required the workers to be reinstated for 45 days. It also includes a “phased plan for return-to-duty,” which means the employees will be returning to work. It does not say what happens after the 45-day window expires.

The entire statement issued March 11 from USDA reads:

“On Wednesday, March 5, the Merit Systems Protection Board (MSPB) issued a 45-day stay on the termination of U.S. Department of Agriculture probationary employees. By Wednesday, March 12, the Department will place all terminated probationary employees in pay status and provide each with back pay, from the date of termination. The Department will work quickly to develop a phased plan for return-to-duty, and while those plans materialize, all probationary employees will be paid.”

Communication from officials at Superior National Forest with local media has become scarce since the Trump administration took office in January. Most questions sent from Paddle and Portage (and other media) are now directed to the Washington D.C. office, unless those questions are specific to Superior National Forest. Media questions handled from the local Forest Service staff are routed through Milwaukee after being cleared, according to conversations Paddle and Portage had with officials from the Superior National Forest communications department.

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