This place is getting worse than slashdot for uninformed comments...
OK. This is how it actually works. You know, the actual US law and stuff.
You know this is a BS lawsuit for the same reason that the perennial news story here - "patent violation" lawsuit filed in a West Texas court. Its court shopping by parties with no legal case. If it was a genuine lawsuit with merit it would have been filed in the relevant court district. In this case the DC District. You know. Where the Executive Branch is. The SF judge despite his rather creative investigations during the Java trial has a history of getting his rulings thrown out by appellate courts. He is a political judge who has a bad habit of making up law that fits his political views.
Like the fact that almost all Federal employees when first employed are on a three year probation. At will employment. Even after the three years if your programme / project gets shutdown and you cannot swing a transfer to another project / dept, well its out the door. For example, a lot of long term Lawrence Livermore Federal employees (Dept of Energy) got their 90 day notice in the early 1990's. When the Soviet Union disappeared. Some went to RAND and SRI. Most did not. So nothing new. Situation changes (like the $40T national debt)..
Exactly the same legal situation for most state employees too. CA is heading towards its once a decade bankruptcy so lots of state employees are going to get fired. By Democrats. Just like they were last time around 2008/2012.
All political appointees in the Federal system (all 60k plus) are at will.
All Federal employees of depts / agencies that are not explicitly created by Congressional statute are de-facto and (mostly) de-jure at will employees. EO agencies are easy. Like USAID. The Executive gives, the Executive takes away. Its the Executives prerogative.
The Dept of Education is almost in the same legal situation. It does manage some statuary programmes but most of the rest of the Dept (another Jimmey Carter bright idea) can be dismissed at will. The other Federal agencies / depts will go though a slimming phase (big budget cuts) little different than what happened during the first Reagan Administration. You guys remember that? By the sound of it, probably not.
So nothing new, nothing "unlawful". Just the Executive using its lawful power and those who lost the election using politically "sympathetic" judges to grab some headlines. The initial stay always get reported. Not the fact that the stay expired / was struct down with no substantive change in the final outcome. Because either the judge had no jurisdiction. Or the plaintiffs had no standing. Most of the recent suits were filed by "activist' NGO's. And the occasional union. Which is the same politically.
A political game that has been played pretty much since the 1850's.