US Education Department to Cut Half its Staff As Trump Eyes Its
Department offices bought closed down till Thursday
Agencies cut workers utilizing lump-sum payments, early retirement
Thursday is due date to submit prepare for massive layoffs
(Adds brand-new federal government report on improper payments, paragraphs 12-14)
By Timothy Gardner, Tim Reid, Alexandra Alper and Marisa Taylor
WASHINGTON, March 11 (Reuters) – The U.S. Department of Education said on Tuesday it would lay off nearly half its staff, a possible precursor to closing completely, as federal government firms rushed to meet President Donald Trump’s deadline to submit plans for a second round of mass layoffs.
The terminations belong to the department’s “last mission,” it stated in a press release, alluding to Trump’s vow to eliminate the department, which supervises $1.6 trillion in college loans, implements civil liberties laws in schools and supplies federal financing for clingy districts.
Asked on Fox News whether the shootings would cause the department’s taking apart, Secretary of Education Linda McMahon stated “yes,” including that doing so “was the president’s required.” The layoffs would leave the department with 2,183 workers, below 4,133 when Trump took office in January.
Before revealing the layoffs, the company purchased workplaces in the Washington location near to personnel from Tuesday night through Wednesday, according to an internal notice seen by Reuters. An Education Department representative did not right away react to concerns about the nature of the security problems triggering the closures.
Similar closures worked as a precursor to shuttering the headquarters of the U.S. Agency for International Development, the humanitarian aid firm, and the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, which secures Americans against deceitful lenders.
The layoffs are the latest step in Trump’s sweeping effort to scale down the federal government, led by the world’s wealthiest person Elon Musk and his Department of Government Efficiency. DOGE has cut more than 100,000 jobs across the 2.3 million-member federal civilian administration, frozen most foreign help and canceled countless programs and agreements, despite dozens of lawsuits challenging the legality of those relocations.
DOGE’s blunt-force method has actually irritated numerous White House officials and Republican lawmakers, a few of whom have challenged upset constituents at town halls. Trump told department heads recently that they, not Musk, have the last word on staffing, his first noteworthy public move to limit the Tesla CEO.
All U.S. government firms have been ordered to come up with large-scale layoff strategies by Thursday, establishing the next phase of project. Several firms have offered employees payments to retire early to meet Trump’s demand.
Affected Education Department workers will be put on administrative leave starting on March 21, the department said.
The union representing more than 2,800 department workers stated it would fight the “extreme cuts.”
“What is clear from the previous weeks of mass firings, turmoil, and untreated unprofessionalism is that this routine has no regard for the thousands of employees who have devoted their professions to serve their fellow Americans,” stated Sheria Smith, president of the American Federation of Government Employees Local 252.
Trump and Musk have actually argued that the federal government is inefficient and bloated. DOGE claims it has saved $105 billion in cuts, however it has just openly recorded a fraction of those cost savings, and its accounting has actually been afflicted by mistakes.
The federal government reported an estimated $162 billion in inappropriate payments in financial year 2024, according to a U.S. Government Accountability Office annual report released on Tuesday. The vast bulk were overpayments, the report said. Total federal investments topped $6.75 trillion because fiscal year, according to the Congressional Budget Office.
The overall inappropriate payments figure was down dramatically from 2023’s $236 billion, the GAO stated.
EARLY RETIREMENT OFFERS
Other firms have actually provided lump-sum payments of as much as $25,000 before tax to employees who agree to leave their tasks. Among these are the Office of Personnel Management, the Social Security Administration and the Department of Health and Human Services, including its Food and Drug Administration.
The buyout offers, combined with another program that relieves eligibility requirements for early retirement, are being welcomed as a lower-friction method to help meet the Thursday deadline, human resources specialists at a number of federal companies told Reuters.
The Trump administration has been facing myriad suits after it fired thousands of probationary employees in a first wave of mass layoffs and basically took apart whole departments like USAID and CFPB.
The General Services Administration, which manages the government’s property portfolio, is likewise looking for approval to provide the buyout payments to employees, according to an e-mail sent out by its acting head to staff on Monday and seen by Reuters. The GSA could not be grabbed remark outside of U.S. organization hours. The Securities and Exchange Commission has currently provided bonus offers of as much as $50,000, Reuters reported.
Human resources and public governance professionals stated the appeal of the buyout program is that it is voluntary and less vulnerable to legal challenges. It likewise requires workers who have accepted the offer to pay back the money if they take another federal government task within 5 years.
Only a couple of companies have actually telegraphed how many employees they prepare to cut in the 2nd phase of layoffs. These consist of the Department of Veterans Affairs, which is intending to cut more than 80,000 workers, and the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, which is planning to cut 1,029 staff.
OPM itself has actually offered lump-sum payments to some 650 of its staff members, according to another person with knowledge of the matter. Employees were provided till March 12 to respond.
On Monday, the HR department of the Food and Drug Administration sent out an email to all 19,000 workers announcing a Friday, March 14, deadline for a buyout program. Those who accept would need to retire by April 19.
Late on Monday, HHS sweetened its previous deal by including two months of complete pay in addition to the reward, according to a copy of the e-mail seen by Reuters. HHS could not be grabbed remark outside of typical U.S. organization hours. (Reporting by Timothy Gardner, Alexandra Alper, Tim Reid and Marisa Taylor, extra reporting by Nathan Layne and Kanishka Singh, writing by Nathan Layne and Joseph Ax; Editing by Scott Malone, David Gregorio and Muralikumar Anantharaman)