While critics allege that federal civil service protections exist to protect lazy or useless bureaucrats, the professional civil service does the actual work of administration of public policy programs. In recent years, rhetoric that focuses on the deconstruction of the administrative state has had a deleterious effect on the civil service and government. But, the Biden administration has used its time to rebuild government and confidence in governing, perhaps leaving room for optimism.

In the second part of a two-part discussion, Lisa Parshall spoke to the podcast about the legacy of Trump-era policies like the Schedule F Executive order, the new edition of her book Directing the Whirlwind: The Trump Presidency and the Deconstruction of the Administrative State and her optimism about the state of government administration in the post-Trump era.

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