Trump forced to rehire 24,500 fired federal workers in latest shock ruling

The Trump administration told a federal judge it had given the axe to 24,500 recently hired workers, in the first accounting of the fate of 'probationary' employees.

The government is now rushing to put the workers on leave and find ways to bring them back after the judge ruled that the firings, just part of a massive purge of the bureaucracy, were illegal. 

Federal agencies provided data on just how many probationary workers got fired. They are considered easier to fire because they lack some of the worker protections of long tenured employees. 

Most of the agencies said they had fired a few hundred workers. The Treasury Department terminated about 7,600 people, the Department of Agriculture about 5,700 and the Department of Health and Human Services more than 3,200, according to the filings.