Federal agencies told to submit "reorganization plans," prepare for mass firings
Washington — The federal government's personnel and budget offices issued a memo to the leaders of all executive branch agencies on Wednesday directing them to submit "reorganization plans" within two weeks and prepare for large-scale firings.
In the memo, the heads of the Office of Management and Budget and the Office of Personnel Management asked agencies to submit these plans by March 13 and to prepare for "reductions in force."
"Agencies should also seek to consolidate areas of the agency organization chart that are duplicative; consolidate management layers where unnecessary layers exist; seek reductions in components and positions that are non-critical; implement technological solutions that automate routine tasks while enabling staff to focus on higher-value activities; close and/or consolidate regional field offices to the extent consistent with efficient service delivery; and maximally reduce the use of outside consultants and contractors," the document said. "When taking these actions, agencies should align closures and/or relocation of bureaus and offices with agency return-to-office actions to avoid multiple relocation benefit costs for individual employees."
The news of the memo was first reported by CNN.
The memo outlined some exclusions, including positions "necessary to meet law enforcement, border security, national security, immigration enforcement, or public safety responsibilities"; military personnel; officials who were appointed by President Trump or confirmed by the Senate; the executive office of the president and the U.S. postal service.
The memo was written by OMB Director Russell Vought and OPM Acting Director Charles Ezell.
The message comes after a series of directives from the Elon Musk-helmed Department of Government Efficiency that have caused chaos across government agencies since its creation via an executive order from Mr. Trump on Inauguration Day.
DOGE, which Mr. Trump and Musk said would eliminate government waste, has been going through data systems at agencies, identifying thousands of jobs as redundant or unaligned with the administration's views, prompting mass terminations by federal agency heads. In extreme cases, whole agencies such as USAID have been on the chopping block, although DOGE's actions and constitutionality have been questioned in court.
Over the weekend, Musk posted on his social media site X that all federal employees had received an email with the subject line "What did you do last week?" and directed recipients to list five bullet points by 11:59 p.m. ET on Monday or be fired. Although several high-profile members of the administration posted on social media that they had answered — including White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt — other agency heads said they had directed their employees not to respond.
The White House later said each agency could decide if employees had to reply. But Mr. Trump suggested at the start of a Cabinet meeting on Wednesday that they would be taking another look at the 1 million who did not respond, although he conceded that some could not respond due to the classified nature of their work.
Those who didn't respond "are on the bubble," he said, adding, "maybe they're gonna be gone."
Musk's role at the helm of the agency has been in question, with the administration denying he was is the DOGE administrator — a role specified in Mr. Trump's executive order creating the agency. On Tuesday, the White House said Amy Gleason is the administrator of DOGE, although Justice Department attorneys had said in court papers that they did not know who the administrator is.
