Lawsuit filed over Education Department's manipulation of employees' email messages

Education Department employees found their nonpartisan out-of-office messages were automatically changed to ones criticizing Democrats for the shutdown.

A federal workers union has filed a lawsuit against the Trump administration for altering U.S. Department of Education employees’ out-of-office email messages to include partisan language about a government shutdown without their consent.

The American Federation of Government Employees, which is represented by Democracy Forward and Public Citizen Litigation Group in the matter, accused the administration of going to “unprecedented lengths” to use government infrastructure to “shift the public debate in its favor.”

“This whole-of-government approach to partisan messaging is unprecedented, and it makes a mockery of statutory prohibitions like the Hatch Act,” the complaint states. “Especially pernicious, however, are the Administration’s efforts to co-opt the voices of rank-and-file employees in the nonpartisan civil service to take part in political messaging.”

The Education Department did not immediately respond to a request for comment Friday night.

The lawsuit comes after furloughed employees discovered their out-of-office replies had been manipulated to include language blaming a government shutdown on Democrats.