RIF watch: See which agencies are laying off federal workers

Federal Trade Commission: FTC dismissed around a dozen employees on Feb. 28, impacting its Bureau of Competition, Bureau of Consumer Protection, Office of Public Affairs and Office of Technology. 

General Service Administration: GSA has sent RIF notices to some employees in its Office of Human Resources Management and Office of Customer Experience and severe cuts are expected in the Public Building Service and elsewhere.

• GSA has also eliminated 18F, and laid off virtually all employees there. 
• On March 3, GSA began widespread RIFs focused on its Public Buildings Service, according to two employees briefed on the plans. The agency was expected to lay off 600 employees on Monday with more coming throughout the week. Nearly 40% of GSA's region nine, based in San Francisco and covering California, Nevada, Arizona and Hawaii, were let go, employees said.
• On March 5, region 10 of GSA's Public Buildings Service, which services the northwest and Alaska, sent RIF notices to 165 of 178 employees, according a source familiar with the actions. 

Health and Human Services Department: HHS will eliminate 20,000 jobs from its workforce of 82,000, the department announced on March 27. It has sent RIF notices to 10,000 employees and will use attrition for the remaining 10,000. The Food and Drug Administration has shed 3,500 employees, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention has cut about 2,400 employees and NIH has sent RIF notices to more than 1,200 workers. The Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services has laid off 300 staff. 

Eliminated offices included those tracking cancer rates among firefighters, providing veterinary care caring for lab animals, managing the nation's network of health centers that provide care to 31 million Americans, training new drug reviewers, collecting data on opioid on abuse and leading teams researching infectious diseases, among many others. 

The department's Office of Small and Disadvantaged Business Utilization laid off at least 25 people at HHS headquarters and different components such as the Center for Medicare and Medicaid Services, the Food and Drug Administration, the National Institutes of Health, and the Center for Disease Control and Prevention on April 7. The cuts leave only executive director Shannon Jackson remaining in the office.

• National Institutes of Health: NIH previously received a directive from the Department of Government Efficiency to cut its total staffing—including through RIFs and attriton—down to fiscal 2019 levels, which would mark a reduction of around 3,400 employees.

• HHS will shutter six regional offices in its Office of General Counsel, bringing the agency from 10 OGC offices down to four. Those will be located in Philadelphia, Atlanta, Kansas City, Mo., and Denver. Impacted staff—about 200 of the 300 in the regional offices—will be laid off, according to two employees affected by the changes and informed of the department’s plans. Those RIF notices are expected to go out within 60 days. 

  While HHS Secretary Robert Kennedy said the four offices would provide the same coverage they had previously, the employee had significant concerns about the impact the closures would have on vulnerable populations such as nursing home residents, children in Head Start and hospital patients. HHS’ regional attorneys provide advice and, when necessary, litigate cases on those matters and that work is now less likely to get done, the employee said. 

Homeland Security Department: DHS officials issued RIF notices to all employees in its Office of Civil Rights and Civil Liberties, as well as its Office of the Citizenship and Immigration Services Ombudsman and Office of the Immigration Detention Ombudsman on March 21. The roughly 150 people in the CRCL office have been placed on administrative leave, pending their terminations, as have the approximately 40 employees at CIS Ombudsman and more than 120 employees at OIDO. 

Housing and Urban Development Department: HUD has issued RIF notices to all employees in the Office of Field Policy and Management at the General Schedule-13 level and below, according to a memo obtained by Government Executive. The employees will be terminated May 18. HUD is expected to issue more widespread RIFs in the coming weeks, according to an employee briefed on the matter. 

Interior Department: DOI is planning sweeping reductions to its administrative and support function workforce and will consolidate related offices away from component agencies. Interior will fold areas such as IT, communications, finance, human resources and contracting into the central part of the department, rather than components such as the Bureau of Land Management, Fish and Wildlife Service, National Park Service and others maintaining their own cadres of staff to provide those services. That will be followed by widespread and significant reductions in force to employees in those offices, leading in some cases to 50% cuts to the relevant workforces.

Labor Department: Staff at DOL's Office of Federal Contract Compliance Programs were notified on April 16 that employees in the Mid-Atlantic, Northeast, Southeast, Midwest and Pacific regions as well as the enforcement branch of the national office were put on administrative leave. The Southwest and Rocky Mountain region and national office's policy, operations and administrative branches were not affected. A February internal DOL memo obtained by Government Executive proposed reducing the agency's workforce by 90%, slashing the number of employees from nearly 500 to 50 and cutting the number of regional and field offices from 54 to four. 

NASA: NASA began sending RIF notices to employees on March 10. In an email to staff, acting Administrator Janet Petro told staff it was a "phased reduction in force," meaning more layoffs are expected in the coming days and weeks. She called the cuts "difficult adjustments" impacting "valued members of our team," but said the agency was viewing the changes as "an opportunity to reshape our workforce." NASA has so far laid off only around 20 employees by closing the Office of Technology, Policy and Strategy, the Office of the Chief Scientist and employees working on diversity issues. NASA's RIF and reorganization plan is still forthcoming, Petro said. 

Office of Personnel Management: OPM, which is spearheading the workforce reduction effort across government, has sent RIF notices to at least its Office of Procurement Operations and communications staff. Around 80 people were let go. In late February, OPM virtually eliminated its Human Capital Data Management and Modernization office. Several dozen employees received RIF notices and only 10 were spared. OPM has also laid off employees from its privacy and Freedom of Information Act office. OPM has also eliminated its Chief Technology Office. The agency also issued RIFs to the entirety of its Congressional, Legislative & Intergovernmental Affairs office staff on April 16.

Social Security Administration: SSA has shuttered two offices—its Office of Transformation and Office of Civil Rights—though for now employees there are on administrative leave and have not yet received RIF notices. SSA acting Administrator Leland Dudek is planning to lay off 7,000 employees in total, according to three employees familiar with the plans. 

Treasury Department:

• The Internal Revenue Service began issuing RIFs on April 4. It started with just one entity—the Office of Civil Rights and Compliance—but the cuts are expected to be felt on a widespread basis. The scope and timing of further cuts were not made clear, but the civil rights office saw 75% of its employees get laid off. The Trump administration is expected to slash as many as 20,000 jobs from IRS. 
• Around April 8, the Bureau of Fiscal Service began notifying employees who service bonds for investors that they would be shuttering their offices and outsourcing that work. Hundreds of employees were part of the reductions and more significant cuts are expected shortly. 

U.S. Agency for International Development: The Trump administration in March sent RIF or termination notices to virtually every employee. They are scheduled to separate from the government in July. 

Veterans Affairs Department: VA is aiming to slash its workforce to fiscal 2019 levels, which would mark a reduction of more than 80,000 employees. RIFs are expected to begin this summer. Since 2019, VA has gone on a hiring spree to accommodate the millions of veterans newly eligible for care and benefits. 

Small agencies set for elimination: Trump has signed an executive order to eliminate to the extent allowed by law seven small agencies. The Federal Mediation and Conciliation Service has sent RIF notices to virtually all of its staff, as has much of the U.S. Agency for Global Media. The Institute of Museum and Library Services subsequently followed suit, as did the National Endowment for the Humanities. The Commerce Department is preparing for RIFs within its Minority Business Development Agency. Trump's order also called for the elimination of the Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars in the Smithsonian Institution, the U.S. Interagency Council on Homelessness and the Treasury Department's Community Development Financial Institutions Fund

See something we are missing? Share your experience with us: 

Eric Katz: ekatz@govexec.com; Signal: erickatz.28 

Sean Michael Newhouse: snewhouse@govexec.com; Signal: seanthenewsboy.45 

Erich Wagner: ewagner@govexec.com; Signal: ewagner.47