How to Dismantle a Democracy, One Job Posting at a Time

OPM’s new hiring memo imports the authoritarian playbook—quietly, bureaucratically, and by design.

The Office of Personnel Management (OPM) recently unveiled a "Merit Hiring Plan" that, despite its name, signals a profound departure from a cornerstone of American democracy: the non-partisan, merit-based civil service. Under this plan, every federal job applicant from GS-5 positions upward must now write essays explaining how they would "advance the President's Executive Orders and policy priorities." Political appointees must approve every hire through "executive interviews" that assess "commitment to American ideals."

The hiring reforms aim to complete the systematic takeover of the federal government as outlined in Project 2025 taken directly from the Authoritarian playbook. First came mass firings disguised as efficiency reforms. Then the gutting of oversight agencies. Next, the weakening of enforcement through executive orders. Now, the final step: replacing career professionals with political loyalists through ideological screening. A merit-based civil service that took generations to build is being dismantled via memo.

This pattern is grimly familiar from democratic backsliding worldwide. Hungary and Turkey purged the bureaucracy of the insufficiently loyal. Poland replaced career prosecutors with political allies. In each case, the rhetoric—efficiency, reform, national values—matches what we see in OPM's memo. In each case, the result was identical: competent professionals replaced by incompetent loyalists, leading to corruption, dysfunction, and democratic decay.

To grasp what we stand to lose, we must recall the "spoils system" that merit-based civil service replaced. For America's first century, federal jobs were political prizes. Each presidential election could trigger a wholesale replacement of government workers. Competence was secondary to loyalty.

When Benjamin Harrison became president in 1889, he replaced 31,000 postmasters in his first year. Historical accounts from the period describe widespread chaos as political appointees with no relevant experience took over post offices nationwide. Mail delivery ground to a halt in many communities as party loyalists, often unprepared for their duties, struggled with basic operations.

Corruption thrived alongside incompetence. Customs houses became centers of organized theft, with political appointees routinely skimming funds and shaking down merchants. Chester Arthur—later president—was removed as New York's customs collector for turning it into a hotbed of corruption in service of machine politics.

The spoils system reached its tragic climax in 1881 when Charles Guiteau, believing his political support entitled him to a federal position, assassinated President Garfield after being denied a diplomatic post. This shocking act catalyzed nationwide demand for reform.

The Pendleton Civil Service Reform Act of 1883 revolutionized American government. Federal jobs would go to those capable of performing them, not merely those with political connections. The transformation was profound. By 1900, Americans could expect reliable mail delivery unaffected by partisan politics. Government evolved into an entity that worked for the people, not just for politicians.

This merit system became the bedrock for many significant achievements in American governance. When Upton Sinclair's The Jungle exposed diseased meat in the food supply, professional inspectors—not political cronies—enforced safety standards. When the New Deal created Social Security, career experts built systems that reliably delivered benefits to millions. The CDC, FDA, SEC—all relied on recruiting individuals with specialized knowledge, irrespective of their political affiliations. Could we have landed on the moon if NASA had required party loyalty tests?

The genius of merit-based hiring lies in creating a vital buffer between political power and government function. We need CDC scientists tracking disease based on evidence, not political messaging. We rely on USDA inspectors enforcing safety standards, not partisan agendas. Justice Department attorneys must follow the law, not political vendettas. Elected officials set policy, but career professionals ensure implementation that is lawful, serves the public, and benefits from institutional memory that transcends election cycles.

Today's hiring requirements are more insidious than the old spoils system. While 19th-century patronage was transparently transactional—jobs for political support—this iteration comes wrapped in Orwellian language about "merit."

The contradictions are glaring. Applicants must explain their "commitment to the Constitution" while pledging to "advance the President's Executive Orders"—but what happens when those orders violate the Constitution? The structure makes clear which loyalty matters more.

Beyond the essays, the system ensures political control at every level. Climate scientists can't be hired at NOAA without approval from appointees who deny climate change. Financial regulators need blessing from those who oppose regulation. "Executive interviews" test for "organizational fit," a euphemism for ideological conformity conducted where no record exists of what was asked or answered.

The memo mandates that agencies must "cease using statistics on race, sex, ethnicity or national origin" in hiring decisions—which sounds neutral until you realize it prevents tracking whether qualified minorities are being systematically excluded by these ideological tests. The system is designed to hide its own discrimination.

These loyalty tests arrive at a moment when expertise itself has become politically polarized. Research mapping the political leanings of professionals who typically staff the federal government—lawyers, doctors, scientists, academics, and other skilled workers—reveals overwhelming majorities now identify as Democrats.

This isn't because expertise inherently leans left, but arguably because one party has increasingly embraced anti-intellectualism, science denial, and conspiracy theories. The Republican Party's expertise vacuum has been filled with climate deniers, vaccine skeptics, and economic cranks. Rather than competing for talent on the merits, they're now rigging the system to exclude the vast majority of qualified professionals.

The memo itself acknowledges these requirements will face legal challenges but implements them anyway—a telling admission. They're betting that by the time courts rule, the transformation will be irreversible. The aggressive timeline—monthly progress reports on implementing loyalty tests—sends a clear message: move fast, purge thoroughly, create facts on the ground.

Some career officials will try to protect their agencies from within. But the system is designed to make that impossible. The monthly reporting requirements, the political approval for every promotion or hire, the mandatory essays—all create a paper trail that can be used to purge anyone who resists. Others will challenge these requirements in court. But litigation takes time, and meanwhile the purge continues. By the time any court rules, the transformation may be complete.

The real resistance may come from an unexpected source: reality itself. When financial regulators are picked for ideology rather than expertise, markets fail. When government watchdogs are replaced with party guard dogs, funds go missing and contracts go unfulfilled. When bridge inspectors are chosen for loyalty over competence, bridges collapse. When disease researchers must pledge fealty to political positions, public health suffers. The consequences won't be abstract—they'll be measured in lives lost and futures destroyed.

For 142 years, the merit-based civil service survived because both parties recognized that functional government requires professional expertise. That consensus is dead. We're watching the transformation of public servants into party servants, of a government of laws into a government of loyalty.

This isn't just about losing good government—it's about losing the very ideal that government can transcend partisan politics to serve all Americans. Today, we're sleepwalking back into the same old trap, convinced by those in power that loyalty to them matters more than competence, that political alignment trumps professional expertise, that serving the party is the same as serving the people.

It isn't. It never was. And we're about to relearn that lesson the hard way.