EXCLUSIVE — Former biotech CEO and presidential candidate Vivek Ramaswamy is rolling out his first big domestic policy proposal on Wednesday in a speech, during which he will outline plans to cut the number of employees at federal agencies and address legal questions about the proposal.
The previously unknown candidate, who has experienced a rise to relative fame since launching his 2024 campaign, has said he wants to shut down several federal agencies, doing so by firing employees en masse. Any roles deemed essential would be transferred to the remaining departments.
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The legality of his strategy for doing so will be detailed in his remarks at the America First Policy Institute at 11 a.m. on Wednesday. During his speech, he will first point to the president's statutory authority to design rules for competitive civil service. Ramaswamy will acknowledge that these federal employees fall under “for-cause” protections and thus can only be fired if they are found to have committed severe misconduct. But, he plans to argue, these for-cause protections don't extend to an executive order implementing a mass layoff.
If he is elected and if he attempts to conduct such a mass layoff, it will almost certainly be challenged in the court system. "I'm not concerned," Ramaswamy said in an exclusive interview with the Washington Examiner. "I'm looking forward to it."
"I think that's how we codify these arguments in judicial precedent because I think we will win 6-3 at the Supreme Court," he said.
According to Ramaswamy, the for-cause protection only extends to the agency's ability to fire an employee. Therefore, he believes, an executive order with sweeping layoffs wouldn't be understood as a removal conducted by an agency. Further, he will point to "reduction[s] in force," which are guided by the U.S. Office of Personnel Management. Ramaswamy will explain that these large-scale reductions in staff aren't treated in the same manner by the statute. These only require a 60-day notice and are subject to order-of-retention rules put forward by the OPM.
When it comes to fundamentally reorganizing federal departments, he will note that certain previsions leftover from the 1977 Reorganization Act remain in effect, and he will argue that they provide the president with the ability to exercise independent authority in making changes to agency organization. As for the 1984 Reorganization Act, which required Congress to approve presidential reorganization plans by majority vote in both houses, he will note that it has expired.
The presidential candidate explained the "beauty" of his plan. "You can use executive orders to shut things down," he noted. But, he said, "You can't use it to create expenditures or agencies that don't yet exist — that requires Congress."
He described it as "a one-way ratchet to shut it down."
In particular, Ramaswamy has taken aim at the Department of Education. He wants to move workforce training programs in the department to the Labor Department instead. Another proposal he's made is shutting down the FBI. He plans to similarly conduct a mass layoff and move special agents to various other departments for specialization to take over the FBI's responsibilities.
Ramaswamy believes making these drastic changes to the federal bureaucracy structure will be economically fruitful while providing more accountability.
"We will actually be more effective by increasing specialization, as opposed to what you have is siloed lack of specialization," he said.
In the FBI, he claimed, "You have a lot of non-specialized agents on the front lines." The former biotech CEO instead wants to move investigators with white collar expertise to the Financial Crimes Enforcement Network and similarly those with "drug investigation expertise to the DEA."
Ramaswamy's campaign is not finished doing the math of how much money this plan might save the government, "but the principle saving here, that's financially related, is actually as it relates to unlocking the economic potential of the private sector."
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"The greatest source of economic impediment right now in the private sector is often the regulations — unconstitutional regulations that come from that federal government," he claimed.
Asked why he is the best candidate to do this and why any of his opponents aren't suited to come in and do the same thing, he said, "I think it takes a combination of an outsider who has total disregard for the norms of Washington, D.C. — but also somebody who has been a CEO and understands if somebody works for you and you can't fire them, that means they don't work for you. I have an understanding of that."