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Trump undoing Elon effect: US admin rehiring DOGE-bitten staff, here's why
General Services Administration has given employees, mostly those who managed workspaces, notices for reinstatement
For many sacked in a blitz by the Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) led by President Donald Trump's then-BFF Elon Musk, it's turned out to be a seven-month paid holiday. Musk is out of favour, and now hundreds of federal employees are being asked to return to work.
The General Services Administration has given the employees, mostly those who managed workspaces, until the end of the week to accept or decline reinstatement, according to an internal memo obtained by The Associated Press. Their date of rejoining has been set as October 6.
Since maintenance staff was out, the GSA had to pay others higher costs out of the government exchequer to stay on in dozens of properties after the DOGE moves were reversed following a Trump-Musk brealup.
“Ultimately, the outcome was the agency was left broken and understaffed,” Chad Becker, a former GSA real estate official, told AP. “They didn’t have the people they needed to carry out basic functions,” he added.
He said the sudden reversal of the downsizing reflects how Musk and his DOGE had gone too far too fast.
The GSA, established in the 1940s, manages thousands of federal workplaces and offices. Its rehiring efforts are in line with what several agencies have done.
Last month, the Internal Revenue Service (IRS) said it would allow some employees who took a resignation offer to stay on. The Labor Department has also brought back some employees who took voluntary retirement or buyouts. The National Park Service has reinstated a number of purged employees too.
The GSA is critical to the work of many such agencies as it takes care of their buildings. Starting in March, thousands of GSA employees left with early retirement offers.
Hundreds of others, who are now being recalled, had been dismissed as part of Musk's push to reduce the size of the government workforce. Some of them continued to get paid as their legal challenges held up.
GSA representatives didn’t respond to detailed questions by AP. They also declined to discuss the agency's numbers or decisions.
“GSA’s leadership team has reviewed workforce actions and is making adjustments in the best interest of the customer agencies we serve and the American taxpayers,” an agency spokesman said in an email.
Democrats have assailed Trump's Republican administration's slashing of costs and jobs without much thought.
DOGE had identified the GSA, which had about 12,000 employees at the start of the Trump administration, as a primary target.
The administration slashed GSA’s headquarters staff by 79%, its portfolio managers by 65% and facilities managers by 35%, according to a federal official briefed on the situation. The official, who was not authorized to speak to the media, provided the statistics on condition of anonymity.
The public may soon get a clearer picture of what transpired at GSA. The Government Accountability Office, an independent congressional watchdog, is examining its management, lease terminations and planned building disposals, AP reported.
Musk and Trump, meanwhile, have stopped accusing each other of grave crimes. They even met briefly some days ago at far-right activist Charlie Kirk's funeral.
