Defending America’s Foreign Service

The American Foreign Service Association’s Legal Defense Fund supports members of the U.S. Foreign Service by helping defray legal expenses related to protection of employee rights and AFSA’s right to be a union. AFSA launched three major lawsuits in 2025 in support of employees of the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID), the U.S. Agency for Global Media (USAGM), and the State Department.

The cases challenge the illegal dismantling of USAID and USAGM and aim to safeguard America’s investment in the people devoted to work for a more secure and prosperous world.  AFSA’s legal challenge to the March 2025 union-busting Executive Order seeks to preserve the collective bargaining rights that protect Foreign Service members as they serve their country abroad. The case is expected to ultimately be settled by the U.S. Supreme Court.

AFSA’s LDF has helped to reduce the costs to RIFed members filing individual appeals before the Merit System Protection Board and has paid for employment law experts to provide webinars and guidance to those members who have opted to file their own MSPB appeals.

The LDF has supported members called to testify in the 2022 impeachment hearings and supported victims of anomalous health incidents formerly known as Havana Syndrome. AFSA staff have filed numerous implementation disputes and unfair labor practice charges over violations of our collective bargaining agreements, including over the State Department’s unilateral change in the reduction-in-force regulations and termination of our Collective Bargaining Agreement.  More information is available on the AFSA website.

The LDF has paid out more than $500,000 in 2025. Respected organizations including Democracy Forward and Public Citizen have extended their legal support to AFSA without charge. AFSA has negotiated reduced rates with private attorneys for members. AFSA is only at the beginning of what will be long legal battles to protect our members’ jobs and the right of AFSA to be a union. AFSA members and supporters have donated generously to the Legal Defense Fund over the past 20 years, but the organization will require outside support to continue legal protection in the years ahead.