Veterans' Preference and USERRA in Federal Employment
How Veterans’ Preference and USERRA Protect Federal Employees
Veterans and certain family members receive specific protections in federal hiring and employment under two related, but legally distinct, statutes: veterans’ preference under the Veterans Employment Opportunities Act (VEOA), and the Uniformed Services Employment and Reemployment Rights Act (USERRA). See our Federal Sector Employment Law overview for how these fit alongside the other frameworks covered on this site.
Veterans' Preference: How the Point System Works
Veterans’ preference gives eligible veterans additional points on their scores when applying for federal jobs, going back to a tradition dating to the Civil War era. It applies to all new appointments in the competitive service and many positions in the excepted service — but importantly, it does not guarantee you a job, and it generally doesn’t apply to internal agency actions like promotions, transfers, or reassignments once you’re already a federal employee.
- 5-point preference generally applies to veterans with a campaign or expeditionary medal, veterans with 180 or more continuous days of honorable active-duty service, or Vietnam-era veterans.
- 10-point preference generally applies to veterans with a compensable service-connected disability rating, Purple Heart recipients, and certain unmarried surviving spouses or mothers of veterans who died in service or from a service-connected disability.
The 10-point preference carries a particularly significant practical effect: if you score above the cutoff on a certified list of eligible candidates, the hiring official generally cannot pass over you in favor of a non-preference candidate without specific justification.
How to Challenge a Veterans' Preference Violation: The VEOA Process
If you believe an agency violated your veterans’ preference rights — failing to apply your preference points correctly, improperly closing an announcement, or passing over you in favor of a less-qualified non-preference candidate — the process generally works like this:
- File with DOL first. You must file a complaint with the Department of Labor’s Veterans’ Employment and Training Service (VETS) within 60 days of the alleged violation.
- DOL investigates. The Department of Labor generally has 60 days to investigate and attempt to resolve the complaint.
- Then you can appeal to the MSPB. If DOL doesn’t resolve the complaint within that 60-day window, you can appeal to the MSPB any time after the 61st day. If DOL does issue a decision, you generally have only 15 days from receiving it to appeal to the MSPB — a notably short window.
If you win a VEOA appeal, the MSPB can order the agency to comply with the violated statute or regulation, award back pay and lost benefits, and award attorney’s fees and litigation costs. If the agency knew, or recklessly disregarded whether, its conduct was unlawful, enhanced or liquidated damages may also be available.
USERRA: Reemployment Rights and Anti-Discrimination for Federal Employees
USERRA protects federal employees (and employees generally, across all employer types) who leave a civilian job for military service, guaranteeing reemployment rights and protection from discrimination based on military service. For federal employees specifically, MSPB jurisdiction over USERRA claims covers two distinct types of cases:
- Reemployment cases: claims that an agency failed to properly reemploy you after you completed a period of military service, such as a call to active duty.
- Discrimination cases: claims that an agency denied you initial employment, reemployment, retention, promotion, or any other benefit of employment because of your military service.
A notable procedural advantage: unlike most other federal employment claims, a federal employee can file a USERRA claim directly with the MSPB, without first exhausting a separate administrative process — though you can also choose to file with DOL VETS first if you prefer. This is meaningfully more direct than the process for many other federal employment claims covered elsewhere on this site.
USERRA claims can also be raised as an affirmative defense within another otherwise-appealable MSPB case — for example, if you’re separately appealing a removal, you can argue within that same appeal that the real motivation was retaliation for your military service. See our MSPB adverse action appeals page for that broader process.
Talk to a Veterans' Preference and USERRA Attorney
Whether you believe your veterans’ preference was ignored during a federal hiring process, or you’ve faced retaliation or a reemployment denial connected to your military service, Wilkenfeld Law Office can help you understand your rights and the applicable deadlines.
Or call 301.245.3035 · Intake@WilkenfeldLO.com