Trump Administration Orders Purge of Federal Employee COVID Vaccine Records
Move aims to end lingering effects of pandemic-era mandates by September 8 deadline.
WASHINGTON — The Trump administration on Friday directed all federal agencies to delete records related to employees’ COVID-19 vaccination status, part of what officials describe as an effort to roll back “many harmful policies of the Biden-Harris Administration.”
“Effective immediately, federal agencies may not use an individual’s COVID-19 vaccine status, history of noncompliance with prior COVID-19 vaccine mandates, or requests for exemptions from such mandates in any employment-related decisions, including but not limited to hiring, promotion, discipline, or termination,” wrote Scott Kupor, Director of the U.S. Office of Personnel Management (OPM), in a memo to department heads.
Agencies have until September 8, 2025, to comply with the directive. Since returning to office, Trump has eliminated federal vaccine mandates, scrapped testing requirements for onsite work, and rescinded mask rules across all executive agencies. His administration has described these pandemic measures as “government overreach” that infringed on personal freedoms and disrupted operations, The Washington Examiner’s Samantha-Jo Roth reported.
“Things got out of hand during the pandemic, and federal workers were fired, punished, or sidelined for simply making a personal medical decision,” Kupor said in a statement. “That should never have happened. Thanks to President Trump’s leadership, we’re making sure the excesses of that era do not have lingering effects on federal workers.”
In September 2021, then-President Joe Biden ordered COVID-19 vaccinations for all federal employees, federal contractors, and healthcare workers at facilities receiving Medicare or Medicaid funding. The mandate affected 2.1 million government workers and millions more in the private sector, with unvaccinated federal employees facing termination.
The OPM directive follows recent news that advocacy group Feds for Freedom (FFF) reached a “landmark” settlement with the Department of Justice over the mandates.
“This settlement marks a significant victory for individual rights and serves as a powerful, implicit acknowledgment of the government’s overreach, achieved through Feds For Freedom’s relentless pursuit of justice,” the group said in a press release.
“Our victory is a long-overdue confirmation of what we have asserted all along: COVID mandates were unconstitutional, immoral, and un-American,” said Feds For Freedom President Marcus Thornton.
Previously, UOJ reported that U.S. President Donald Trump and Russian President Vladimir Putin will hold talks in Alaska on ending the War in Ukraine.
