Feb. 26 (UPI) — The U.S. Office of Management and Budget Wednesday ordered federal agencies to submit mass layoff reorganization plans by March 13. It claims tax dollars are benefitting “radical interest groups.”
“The federal government is costly, inefficient, and deeply in debt,” the OMB memo said. “At the same time, it is not producing results for the American public. Instead, tax dollars are being siphoned off to fund unproductive and unnecessary programs that benefit radical interest groups while hurting hardworking American citizens.”
The memo added, “The American people registered their verdict on the bloated, corrupt federal bureaucracy on November 5, 2024, by voting for President Trump and his promises to sweepingly reform the federal government.”
The memo called for “a significant reduction in the number of full-time equivalent positions by eliminating positions that are not required” and “a reduced federal property footprint.”
The guidance included continuing a hiring federal hiring freeze “implementing the general principle that, subject to appropriate exemptions, no more than one employee should be hired for every four employees that depart.”
This round of mass federal job cuts targets a wider swath of workers and not just probationary employees like most recent firings.
The Trump administration Department of Government Efficiency led by Elon Musk has already induced more than 77,000 federal workers to take buyout offers.
In an exclusive front-page story Wednesday the Washington Post reported that while Musk gleefully cuts federal jobs on a mission to slash federal spending, Musk’s business have profited from $38 billion in federal money.
“Elon Musk and his cost-cutting U.S. DOGE Service team have been on a mission to trim government largesse,” the Post story said. “Yet Musk is one of the greatest beneficiaries of the taxpayers’ coffers. Over the years, Musk and his businesses have received at least $38 billion in government contracts, loans, subsidies and tax credits.”
At a Wednesday Cabinet meeting President Donald Trump claimed the cuts will be “a little more surgical” but that they will cut some federal agency staffing by ore than half and would effectively dissolve the federal Education Department.
As Trump slashes federal jobs, nobody in the Executive Office of the President will have to worry about being axed in the mass firings, according to the OMB memo.
The Wednesday OMB memo also excluded “positions that are necessary to meet law enforcement, border security, national security, immigration enforcement, or public safety responsibilities.”
Military personnel, the U.S. Postal Service and all federal uniformed personnel are also excluded from the mass firings.
The mass federal firings are being challenged in court as they proceed seemingly without regard to legal requirements governing federal personnel.
A federal appeals court in Washington, D.C. Feb. 16 blocked a Trump administration effort to fire Hampton Dellinger, the Office of Special Counsel head that oversees workplace protections for federal workers.
Six federal fired federal workers were reinstated for 45 days at Dellinger’s request Wednesday. He said his office would continue to pursue allegations of unlawful personnel actions by the Trump administration in these firings.