A judge on Thursday granted a restraining order against the Office of Personnel Management, saying it illegally ordered thousands of job terminations of certain federal employees and must retract its directives and dealing a blow to President Donald Trump’s efforts to slim down the government quickly and dramatically.

The judge said that the Office of Personnel Management had no authority to order government organizations to fire workers.

A federal judge temporarily blocked the Trump administration from mass firing of probationary federal employees.

U.S. President Donald Trump's administration on Wednesday ordered federal agencies to undertake more large-scale layoffs of workers, while the president let downsizing czar Elon Musk take a star role at his first cabinet meeting and discuss his ambitious budget-cutting targets.

Musk thinks he can cut $6.7 trillion budget by $1 trillion this year, a reduction that would likely entail significant disruption of government programs