The other important point about the SES is that the president has no role in choosing them; he can’t re-assign them or fire them. The SES comprises the non-transparent group of managers and elites who run the country from within. They are the employees who quietly block, slow-walk, and defer presidential orders. What President Trump and Kash Patel might call the “deep state.” In effect, our democracy has been turned upside down while being captured by bureaucratic and corporate interests that endorse authoritarian policies - hence, we are now living under a system of “inverted totalitarianism.” The United States has been co-opted into a managed democracy, thanks to Carter and Obama.

President Trump was stymied in his efforts to reform the government due to the SES cadre, and then he finally hit upon a solution. That is an executive order known as “Schedule F,” which he signed in October 2020, just prior to leaving office. Biden canceled the Schedule F executive order on the first day of his presidency.

This new employee classification system would have included federal workers in "confidential, policy-determining, policy-making, or policy-advocating character," which are "not normally subject to change as the result of a presidential transition."

The “Schedule F” executive order would have allowed agencies to reclassify policy jobs under a new employment schedule and had proposed to give senior managers greater flexibility in hiring candidates and firing employees. Hence, the SES employees would have functionally become “at will” employees. At-will employment means that an employer can dismiss an employee for any reason, without having to establish "just cause" for termination, as long as the reason is not illegal. At-will employment is the law of the land in all states except Montana.