TRUMP, DOGE, AND THE REPUBLICANS DO NOT CARE ABOUT EFFICIENCY
The Trump administration, the Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE), and the Republicans in Congress do not care about efficiency and making government work better. They are focused on destroying our federal government and making it unable to perform functions we all rely on in our everyday lives. Please contact your members of Congress and ask them to oppose indiscriminate firing of federal workers.
(Note: If you find a post too long to read, please just skim the bolded portions. Thanks for reading my blog!)
I probably don’t need to tell you that Elon Musk’s Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) does not care about efficiency. DOGE and the Trump administration are focused on destroying our federal government and making it unable to perform functions we all rely on in our everyday lives.
They are undermining the agencies and systems that keep us safe, including:
Military and intelligence systems that keep us, our country, and our troops safe from physical and cyber attacks.
Law enforcement agencies that keep us safe from both physical and cyber crime.
Public health agencies that protect us from diseases and unsafe air and water.
Agencies that keep us safe from dangerous consumer products, financial scams, and hazardous working conditions.
The agency that keeps us safe when we fly.
They are undermining everything that makes us a civilized society, and, of course, everything that makes us a democracy, including the health and education systems that allow all of us and our economy to prosper.
Their extensive and random firings of employees with no rationale other than claiming financial savings from reducing the payroll make it clear their intent is destruction and NOT efficiency. The fraudulent nature of their claims of waste is exposed by the situations where they have had to re-hire employees after learning what the employees did. These are NOT thoughtful reductions in the workforce after carefully identifying opportunities for efficiency; this is indiscriminate slashing of the workforce.
Roughly 11% (more than one out of ten) of the 2.4 million federal civilian employees (excluding postal workers) have been fired, have resigned, or have otherwise been relieved of their positions. Most have been relatively new employees within their two-year probationary period. No assessment was made of the need for these workers or of their job performance.
Here are just a few examples (of many) of their destructive firings and forced departures of government workers: [1]
The Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) has had 300 employees cut, despite 90% of its facilities having been previously identified as being understaffed. It was already short 3,000 air traffic controllers and at least 800 technicians. The airliner crash in D.C. may have been because air traffic control hadn’t paid enough attention to keeping the military helicopter out of the airspace of the jet that was landing. The more recent close calls in Chicago and D.C., where a plane landing had to abort because there was another plane on or near the runway, almost certainly reflect air traffic control errors.
Workers tracking the bird flu virus were fired and then re-hired.
Workers overseeing the safety of our nuclear weapons were fired and then re-hired. Roughly 300 fired employees at the National Nuclear Security Agency (NNSA) were re-hired after DOGE learned that they were responsible for managing the US nuclear weapons arsenal.
Senior military leaders, including the leaders of the military justice system, were fired and are being replaced with political loyalists. This is not about efficiency; it’s about establishing dictatorial power.
76,000 civilian employees at the Defense Department will be fired. The largest amount of waste, fraud, and abuse in the federal government is in the Defense Department, and particularly in its contracts with private companies. Yet this has not been a focus of DOGE. A huge reduction in civilian employees will undoubtedly weaken the oversight of contracts with private companies. Ironically, in the budget outline just approved by Republicans in Congress, the Defense Department receives a significant increase ($100 billion over 10 years in the House’s proposal and $150 billion in the Senate’s)! This makes it unequivocally clear that cutting waste, fraud, and abuse is NOT what Trump, DOGE, and the Republicans are doing.
The Social Security Commissioner has been removed, five of eight regional commissioners have departed, and the plan is to fire half of the 57,000 workers at the Social Security Administration, despite it already being at a 50 year low in its number of employees. How long will it be before Social Security is unable to enroll new eligible seniors, to stop payments to those who have passed away, to resolve problems, and even, ultimately, to keep payments flowing to current recipients?
Over a dozen senior leaders and 1,000 of the 17,000 employees (6%) at the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) are gone, despite pre-existing personnel shortages. Many of its most experienced disaster recovery leaders are gone, with hurricane season arriving shortly.
Over a dozen Inspectors General and the director of the office that protects whistleblowers have been fired. These offices were specifically established to root out waste and fraud in government, so this is clearly NOT an effort to increase efficiency. It can only be seen as an effort to allow waste and fraud that benefits Trump, Musk, members of the administration, and their cronies.
The Consumer Financial Protection Bureau has been shut down. This is clearly NOT an effort to increase efficiency. It can only be seen as an effort to allow fraud and abusive financial practices that benefit Trump, Musk, and large banks, credit card, and financial companies.
The Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) and its 15,000 employees will be cut by 65%.
The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) has lost 1,000 workers. Its weather, marine, and storm forecasts are essential to all Americans. It also operates the two U.S. tsunami warning centers and staff there have been fired.
The Small Business Administration has had 20% of its staff cut (720 people).
USAID has been shut down and on and on.
It is abundantly clear that the Trump administration, Musk, DOGE, and Republicans in Congress have no interest in efficiency or making government work better. They want to break our government and turn our democracy into a dictatorship. Mindlessly slashing hundreds of thousands of government workers is harming our safety in multiple ways and weakening our economy. It is increasing unemployment and the number of people who will need public assistance because they can’t pay the rent, afford health care, or pay for food and medicine. It reduces what these former government employees pay in taxes and contribute to the economy through their everyday spending.
I urge you to contact your US Representative and Senators and ask them to take action to stop the indiscriminate firing of government workers. You can find contact information for your US Representative at http://www.house.gov/representatives/find/ and for your US Senators at http://www.senate.gov/general/contact_information/senators_cfm.cfm.
[1] Cox Richardson, H., 2/27/25, “Letters from an American,” (https://heathercoxrichardson.substack.com/p/february-27-2025)