Fact Sheet: Understanding Suitability & Fitness

On March 20, 2025, President Trump signed a new Presidential Memorandum, “Strengthening the Suitability and Fitness of the Federal Workforce.” This Presidential Memorandum (PM) delegates authority to the Office of Personnel Management (OPM) (and directs it to issue new regulations) that allow OPM to make adverse suitability or fitness determinations based on a federal employee’s _post-appointment _conduct. This PM—and the upcoming OPM regulations—continue the Trump Administration’s efforts to centralize individual federal personnel decisions with OPM.

What is Suitability and Fitness?
Suitability and fitness refer to a decision that an individual does or does not have the required level of character and conduct necessary to perform work for a Federal agency. These determinations are based on whether a person's character or conduct may have an adverse impact on the integrity or efficiency of the federal service.

The difference in terminology—suitability or fitness—is based on the type of position being adjudicated. Suitability determinations are made in reference to positions in the competitive service or career Senior Executive Service, whereas fitness determinations are made for excepted service positions.

What are the current Suitability and Fitness standards?
Under 5 U.S.C. 3331 and 7301, Congress authorizes the President to prescribe regulations to govern the admission into the civil service in the executive branch. The regulations must “best promote the efficiency” of the executive branch civil service and “ascertain the fitness of applicants with respect to character.” Through various Executive Orders, the President has delegated this authority to OPM, designating OPM as the President’s Suitability Executive Agent. 

OPM, via regulations at 5 CFR Part 731, has laid out the criteria used to make suitability and fitness determinations. More particularly, a suitability or fitness determination must, according to current regulations, be based on one or more of a set of specific factors related to the integrity or efficiency of the service, including:
(1)  Misconduct or negligence in employment;
(2)  Criminal conduct;
(3)  Material, intentional false statement, or deception or fraud, in examination or appointment;
(4)  Dishonest conduct;
(5)  Excessive alcohol use, without evidence of rehabilitation, of a nature and duration that suggests the applicant or appointee would be prevented from performing the duties of the position in question, or would constitute a direct threat to the property or safety of the applicant, appointee, or others;
(6)  Illegal use of narcotics, drugs, or other controlled substances, without evidence of rehabilitation;
(7)  Knowing and willful engagement in acts or activities designed to overthrow the U.S. Government by force;
(8)  Any statutory or regulatory bar that prevents the lawful employment of the individual in the position in question; and
(9)  Violent conduct

Who makes Suitability and Fitness determinations?
Under the current approach, OPM has delegated most suitability and fitness determinations to individual agencies. As a general matter, agencies review the background investigations of applicants for employment and determine whether the applicant is suitable or fit for a particular role. 

OPM, however, has retained authority over certain suitability decisions, including in cases involving evidence of material, intentional false statements; deception or fraud in examination or appointment; refusal to furnish testimony; or evidence of other egregious conduct. Further, only OPM can issue a governmentwide debarment due to a suitability determination.

What does this PM do?
President Trump’s PM expands OPM’s role in the suitability context by delegating to the Director of OPM “the authority to make final suitability determinations and take suitability actions regarding employees in the executive branch based on post-appointment conduct.” The phrase “post-appointment conduct” is new terminology in the suitability context and is not further defined in the PM. But the PM does make clear that “a suitability action can include a directive by OPM to the head of an executive department or agency to remove an employee who does not meet the [post-appointment conduct] suitability criteria.”

In addition to delegating this authority to OPM, the PM directs OPM to issue regulations “to implement appropriate rules and procedures regarding suitability determinations and suitability actions based on post-appointment conduct.” And the PM provides guidance on what OPM should include in those regulations: first, “the Director of OPM shall consider requiring that an employing agency must make a referral to OPM in order for the Director of OPM to make a final suitability determination and take a suitability action regarding an employee based on post-appointment conduct,” and, second, “if the Director of OPM issues specific instructions as to separation or other corrective action with regard to an employee, including cancellation of a personnel action, the head of the agency concerned shall comply with the Director of OPM’s instructions within 5 work days.”

How does the PM change current suitability procedures?
The PM lays the legal groundwork for two major changes to the suitability process. 

First, it introduces the broad concept of “post-appointment conduct” as a basis for suitability and fitness determinations and actions. Second, it centralizes suitability and fitness decisions based on “post-appointment conduct” with OPM. In other words, the PM both provides a new, seemingly vague basis for removing federal employees (by deeming them unsuitable based on “post-appoint conduct”) and grounds the decision-making for that removal with OPM, not individual agencies.

Of course, this PM comes at a time when the Trump Administration has tried to use OPM to direct personnel actions at individual agencies—a move that courts have deemed exceeds OPM’s authority. In this respect, this PM may be a response to those rulings in that the President is attempting to provide OPM with explicit authority over these suitability and fitness decisions.

When will these changes go into effect?
The PM provides that the delegation to OPM to make suitability determinations and take suitability actions based on “post-appointment conduct” will not go into effect until OPM completes the rulemaking. 

On March 21, OPM sent a draft proposed rule to the Office of Information and Regulatory Affairs within the Office of Management and Budget, which means that the draft proposed rule is currently undergoing an interagency review within the government. After that review is complete—which may take up to 90 days—OPM will likely publish a Notice of Proposed Rulemaking. At that point the public will likely have a period of time (30 to 60 days) to comment on the proposed rule. OPM must account for those comments when it issues a final rule.