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Politics
Sidney Shapiro, Professor of Law, Wake Forest University

Donald Trump wants to reinstate a spoils system in federal government by hiring political loyalists regardless of competence

Donald Trump Andrew Jackson George Washington the White House the US Postal Service
Then-President Donald Trump standing underneath a portrait of Andrew Jackson in November 2017. Oliver Contreras-Pool/Getty Images)

If elected to serve a second term, Donald Trump says he supports a plan that would give him the authority to fire as many as 50,000 civil servants and replace them with members of his political party loyal to him. Under this plan, if he eventually deemed those new employees disloyal, he claims he could fire them too.

The United States has tried such a plan before.

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