# Plain Language Summary: Federal Government Reform Act of 2025

This bill makes several changes to how the federal government operates, with the main goal of cutting costs and making agencies work more efficiently. The most immediate action is shutting down the Federal Executive Institute in Charlottesville, Virginia, which trains senior government officials. The government will stop funding this facility within 90 days of the bill passing.

The bill also changes how federal employees are hired and evaluated. New federal employees will now go through a one-year probationary period where their agency must officially certify that keeping them employed is in the public interest. If an agency doesn't provide this certification before the year is up, the employee is automatically fired. This applies to most new hires in competitive federal positions, including people moving between federal jobs or returning to federal work. The goal here is to make it easier to remove employees who aren't performing well during their first year.

On the regulatory side, the bill restricts federal agencies from creating rules that include criminal penalties unless Congress has already written those penalties into law. Agencies must also review their existing regulations and report back within a year about any rules that impose criminal penalties without clear legal authority. Additionally, the bill pushes the Federal Register to modernize its outdated computer systems and speed up how quickly new regulations get published, with a target of publishing rules within 24 hours of receiving them.

Finally, the bill directs the Treasury Department to modernize how the government handles payments by moving away from paper-based systems and old technology created before 2000, replacing them with secure digital payment options. The Office of Management and Budget will oversee all these changes and report back to Congress within six months on how agencies are implementing the reforms.