Confusion, fear in federal workforce as agencies face deadline to plan staff cuts

(CNN) — Widespread confusion and fear rippled through the federal workforce Thursday as federal agencies faced a key deadline in President Donald Trump’s push to drastically downsize the government.

Thursday is the deadline for agencies to hand their cost-cutting proposals in to the White House and the Office of Personnel Management. It wasn’t clear whether those plans would be made public, or when agencies will fully implement them – a process that could see the federal workforce reduced by tens of thousands of jobs, in addition to cuts the Trump administration has already made.

Many federal workers told CNN there was confusion about whether they would learn their agencies’ “reduction in force” plans Thursday or in the coming days, and said people are keeping their phones close to check frequently for updates.

At one federal agency, a supervisor ended a meeting early this week and told staffers to take the extra time to download their personnel files and update their resumes, according to an employee who attended.

“The mood is just very uneasy – no one knows what tomorrow will look like as a government employee,” a current Department of Energy worker said. “There is definitely lots of anxiety about what is to come.”

Already, more than 103,000 federal workers have been laid off as part of efforts by Trump and the tech billionaire Elon Musk-led Department of Government Efficiency to reduce spending. Much of DOGE’s work so far has been shrouded in secrecy.

The administration has laid off tens of thousands of probationary workers, though a federal judge on Thursday ordered some of them reinstated. The administration has placed others on administrative leave, offered a deferred resignation package in February that allowed those who voluntarily leave their jobs (about 77,000 workers, according to White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt) to be paid through the end of September, and ordered workers to return to their offices full time – even though some offices don’t have enough space for their full workforces.

Details of some agencies’ plans were trickling out Thursday. The Internal Revenue Service submitted a plan to slash more than 18,000 employees – about 18% of its staff – by May 15 in the first phase of a reduction in force.

Thursday’s deadline is the first of a two-phase effort. The Office of Management and Budget and the Office of Personnel Management, in a memo to agency leaders, required a plan to shed staffers by identifying those whose functions are not mandated by laws or regulations and are not considered essential employees during government shutdowns.

In the second phase, OMB and OPM asked for an outline of “a positive vision for more productive, efficient agency operations going forward,” including a proposed organizational chart and relocations of offices away from the Washington, DC, metro area. Those are due no later than April 14 and should be implemented by September 30.

The firings are being met with legal challenges from Democratic-led states. Twenty-one attorneys general on Thursday sued the Trump administration after the Department of Education eliminated nearly half of its 4,100-person workforce.

A Department of Education employee who survived the cuts earlier in the week said there is a combination of lasting anxiety and reality setting in at the agency about what has happened, as Trump’s administration begins to act on his campaign promise to shutter the agency. With the department’s offices closed Wednesday due to the cuts being made, many employees, teleworking from home, spent time consoling each other over tearful calls and supportive messages.

“Statements from the Education Department praising the remaining staff for their commitment and years of experience are falling flat – we all know that the people who were fired are just as dedicated and experienced as those who weren’t,” the current Department of Education employee said. “There was no consideration of expertise, experience, or performance in these cuts - it was an across-the-board cutting based on office zip codes. To imply otherwise is offensive to the good work of those who were fired.”

The Bureau of Reclamation – the federal agency tasked with managing America’s largest dams including Hoover and Glen Canyon – is facing as much as a 40% staff cut, although the final number could be lower, three people familiar with the matter told CNN. And the agency still doesn’t have a nominee for the commissioner to lead it.

DOGE representative Tyler Hassen was recently promoted to be the Interior Department’s assistant secretary for policy, management and budget, according to an order from Interior Secretary Doug Burgum. It’s a high-ranking position that gives Hassen power to oversee the budget for Interior and its various bureaus. An Interior spokesperson declined to comment on personnel matters and did not respond to CNN’s question on whether Hassen was overseeing the staffing cuts effort at the department.

An employee at the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration said the frustration and confusion of the impending layoffs is affecting some aspects of their work.

At NOAA, three sources inside and outside the agency told CNN the agency’s reduction in force plan involved laying off around 1,000 people across the organization.

The worker said employees there are aware of the planned cuts, but they don’t know who or when, and said that uncertainty combined with insults from Trump’s White House and Capitol Hill have “hit morale hard.”

“We are hearing most information about our own agency through the news, not from leadership,” the federal employee said. “Uncertainty is crippling our ability to plan and strategize certain aspects of our work. Some functions that are highly standardized are continuing mostly as usual, but all other work is just thrown into chaos.”

NOAA oversees agencies including the National Weather Service and NOAA Fisheries. One source outside the agency said the cuts could impact whether fishing seasons for certain fish start on time. NOAA also monitors tides and currents for marine vessels, providing ships the data they need to pass safely as well as supplying information to the US Coast Guard for search and rescue operations.

“Our long-standing practice is not to discuss internal personnel and management matters,” said NOAA spokesperson Susan Buchanan, adding that the agency would “continue to provide weather information, forecasts and warnings pursuant to our public safety mission.”

Several federal workers’ union leaders have also said they have been kept in the dark about their agencies’ plans.

The Social Security Administration has not yet posted a reduction in force plan or provided information to the American Federation of Government Employees, which represents about 42,000 workers at the agency, said Rich Couture, a spokesperson for AFGE’s Social Security General Committee. But agency leaders have said they will share the plan once it is finalized, at least internally.

Social Security has already announced that it is seeking to shed 7,000 positions, or 12% of its workforce of 57,000 employees. However, it is hoping that many of the cuts will come from employees voluntarily departing, either by retiring, accepting a buyout offer of up to $25,000 or taking an early retirement incentive. But if not enough staffers leave, the agency will implement layoffs.

The agency has already started downsizing its operations, shuttering several offices, including the Office of Civil Rights and Equal Opportunity, and consolidating its 10 regional offices into four.

Social Security did not immediately return a request for comment.

All the uncertainty is causing “major anxiety” within the Social Security workforce right now, with employees wondering whether their division or position are considered “mission critical,” Couture said. The poor morale is already affecting workers’ productivity.

“The overall situation hurts public service,” Couture said, noting the agency is already short staffed and can’t afford to lose more workers without it affecting customer service.

CNN’s Rene Marsh contributed to this report.

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