Podcast
Civil Rights for Civil Servants
Hear Shaun Southworth and Lydia Taylor explain federal employee rights, public service, workplace systems, and the people navigating them.
Listen to the podcastNews, rights, tools & learning
Federal Employee Resource Center
Search timely updates, plain-English explainers, practical guides, podcasts, and mindful-action resources. Start with the question you are trying to answer.
Should Musk Testify Under Oath? Two House Democrats Ask After GAO Finds DOGE Savings of $92 Million, Not $10.5 Billion
Two House Democrats have asked for Elon Musk and DOGE officials to testify under oath about DOGE's savings numbers, after a GAO audit found that DHS's claimed $10.5 billion in cont...
D.C. Circuit: IRS Data-Sharing With ICE "Indisputably Contravenes" Federal Tax Privacy Law
The lawsuit filed to keep DOGE out of IRS taxpayer data just won at the D.C. Circuit. On September 8, 2026, a unanimous panel in Center for Taxpayer Rights v. IRS, No. 26-5006 (D.C...
Searched by Diagnosis Code: What the Pentagon's Medical Record Reviews Mean for Every Federal Employee's Confidential File
Federal employee medical privacy is suddenly a live question. Federal News Network reported this week that service members are being identified for separation through their electro...
USDA Says 64% Accepted Relocation. Employees Say the Accept Button Was Not a Choice.
USDA directed reassignments are back in federal court, and the number the department gave the judge is now in dispute. On August 28, a senior USDA official told the court that 725 ...
GAO Audit: DHS Claimed $10.5 Billion in DOGE Contract Savings. Auditors Found $92 Million.
A new GAO audit of DHS contract terminations has put a hard number on the DOGE savings claims that federal employees heard all year. The Department of Homeland Security publicly re...
You Won at the MSPB but the Agency Appealed: Why You Should Still Be Paid While You Wait
MSPB interim relief is the rule that answers a painful scenario. You won your Merit Systems Protection Board case in March. The Administrative Judge ordered you back to work. The a...
Can the Postal Service Reject Your Ballot? The USPS Mail Ballot Rule, the Whistleblower, and the Court Order
The USPS mail ballot rule is about to collide with the election calendar. On September 4, North Carolina mails the first ballots of the 2026 midterms. At the same time, the Postal ...
Paid 24.72% Under Market, Then Frozen: What the 2027 Federal Pay Freeze Letter Really Says
The federal pay gap is the number almost nobody is covering. Most of the reporting on the 2027 federal pay freeze has focused on the zero itself, or on what next year might bring. ...
OPM Cut the Workload Question: What Changes When Your Agency Runs Its Own Employee Survey
OPM's proposed rule on the Federal Employee Viewpoint Survey would cut the required questions from sixteen to ten, and one of the questions on the chopping block is "My workload is...
IRS Audit Collections Fell 35% the Year It Lost a Quarter of Its Audit Staff, Watchdog Finds
IRS audit collections fell 35 percent last year, according to a new report from the Treasury Inspector General for Tax Administration, in the same year the agency lost roughly 27 p...
Shutdown Averted Until December 11: What the Continuing Resolution Means for Federal Employees
A government shutdown on October 1 has been averted for federal employees, pending the President's signature. The House voted 370 to 48 to pass a continuing resolution that keeps a...
Missing Paragraphs and Phantom Citations: The Drafting Errors Inside the EEOC's Proposed EEO Overhaul
The EEOC proposed rule that would rewrite how every federal employee's discrimination complaint gets decided contains something you would not expect in an officially published regu...
More ways to learn
Choose the format that helps you understand what is happening.
The Mindful Federal Employee is part of a broader public-education ecosystem from Shaun Southworth, Lydia Taylor, and Southworth PC. Use the resource that fits the question and the moment.
Mindfulness
Work Peacefully
Use practical mindfulness tools to create space between workplace pressure and the decision you make next.
Explore mindfulness resourcesAbout the people behind the work
Shaun Southworth & Lydia Taylor
Meet the federal employment attorneys behind this public-education work and the podcast Civil Rights for Civil Servants.
Meet Shaun & LydiaThe Federal Employee Briefing
The important developments, without the all-day scroll.
Join 3,900+ federal employees getting sourced workforce news and practical next steps on weekdays. It is a free public-service resource from Southworth PC.