Case Explained: BRIMER v. NAVY

Court: United States Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit Filed: 2026-08-14 The federal-circuit court vacated the Merit Systems Protection Board’s decision denying corrective action to a veteran and remanded the case for reconsideration. The court held that under 5 U.S.C. § 3304(f)(1) of the Veterans Employment Opportunities Act (VEOA), an agency cannot rely on a veteran’s status as a current federal employee to deny them the right to compete for vacant positions filled through merit promotion procedures when applications are accepted from individuals outside the agency’s own workforce. In reaching this decision, the en banc court overruled its prior precedent in *Kerner v. Department of the Interior*, 778 F.3d 1336 (Fed. Cir. 2015), which had incorrectly held that § 3304(f) applied only to veterans seeking initial federal appointments. The court determined that the plain language of § 3304(f)(1) unambiguously applies to all preference eligibles and veterans regardless of their current employment status, as the statute prohibits denying an opportunity to compete whenever an agency accepts applications from outside its workforce. While the VEOA guarantees the right to compete, the court clarified that this does not exempt veterans from standard eligibility criteria, such as time-in-grade requirements, which apply to all candidates. The practical consequence is that the Merit Systems Protection Board must reconsider Mr. Brimer’s appeal without relying on the now-invalidated interpretation that current federal employees are ineligible for VEOA protections. The Board will determine whether Mr. Brimer was deprived of an opportunity to compete based on the corrected legal standard, specifically examining whether his application was improperly rejected due to a misunderstanding of his eligibility versus a failure to meet objective qualification criteria. Do It For The Case Law is a news reporting service. Nothing in this episode constitutes legal advice.