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Washington, D.C.—The White House executive order abolishing the much-abused Federal Career Intern Program (FCIP) is both a key victory for the nation’s largest independent union of federal employees and an important step in protecting the longstanding merit-based government hiring system, the leader of the union said today.

“NTEU’s longstanding effort to end the FCIP has paid off. I applaud the White House for recognizing that agency misuse of the FCIP far beyond its original intent undercuts a basic pillar of the civil service—fair and open competition for positions— and that it must be ended in its current form,” said President Colleen M. Kelley of the National Treasury Employees Union (NTEU).

Kelley credited the administration decision in large part to NTEU’s continuing efforts to curb widespread agency misuse of the FCIP, including a pending federal court suit challenging Office of Personnel Management (OPM) regulations implementing the program. NTEU is the only federal union challenging the FCIP in court and has been the leader in the fight against abuses of the program.

President Kelley pointed out that it wasn’t until the court rejected the government’s attempt to have the NTEU suit dismissed on procedural grounds that the administration began to seriously consider the lawfulness of the FCIP.

Under today’s executive order, current FCIP hires would be converted to the competitive service without loss of pay or benefits, as NTEU sought.

At the same time, the NTEU leader took a cautious approach to a replacement program advanced by the White House today which would provide a gateway to potential employment with the federal government for persons who will have been graduated from college within the previous two years. Under certain conditions, veterans would have an extended period of eligibility.

Outside of limited internships, NTEU supports competitive hiring in the civil service for all. “We see no reason why the existing competitive hiring procedures should not remain the primary hiring method for recent college graduates,” said President Kelley.

The White House directed OPM to draft and issue implementing regulations on this new program; President Kelley said NTEU awaits these draft regulations with a great deal of interest, and will submit comments before the rules are made final.

“In a similarity with the FCIP, this new program would be an exception to competitive service, and, as such, it should be very narrowly drawn,” she said, adding that “as it was outlined by the White House, we have some concerns about the operation of this new program.”

One such concern centers on assuring there is a cap on the number of positions that can be filled through the program rather than simply a cap on the number of two-year hires that can be later converted to the competitive service.

The FCIP originally was designed to provide two-year structured training and development internships; instead, a number of agencies have come to use it for all new hires—including U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP), which has for some time been using the FCIP to hire all new frontline CBP Officers.

The executive order comes after a November decision by the Merit Systems Protection Board (MSPB) finding that the FCIP violates a statute relating to veterans’ preferences. NTEU filed a friend-of-the-court brief in that matter supporting contentions made by two veterans.

Even before the latest MSPB decision, however, OPM—acting in response to a presidential directive earlier this year—was reviewing the FCIP and developing recommendations to the administration about the future of the program. The president ordered the OPM review in the wake of the court decision in NTEU’s case rejecting the government’s request to dismiss the case on procedural grounds.

As the largest independent federal union, NTEU represents more than 150,000 employees in 31 agencies and departments.