When Trump purged the civil service, he did away with some of the employees who understood the government best: “What’s been lost isn’t just a sense of purpose,” @FranklinFoer argues, “but a body of knowledge—a way of making the machinery of the state function.”

When Trump purged the civil service, he did away with some of the employees who understood the government best: “What’s been lost isn’t just a sense of purpose,” @FranklinFoer argues, “but a body of knowledge—a way of making the machinery of the state function.”