How Trump Has Reshaped The Federal Workforce

Summary

Summary of NPR Politics Podcast Episode: "How Trump Has Reshaped The Federal Workforce" Release Date: May 29, 2025

---

Introduction

In the episode titled "How Trump Has Reshaped The Federal Workforce," NPR's Deepa Shivaram, along with co-host Domenico Montanaro and labor correspondent Andrea Hsu, delve into President Donald Trump's efforts to overhaul the federal government workforce. The discussion explores the administration's strategies, the resulting impact on federal employees, ongoing legal challenges, and the broader implications for both government operations and public perception.

---

Trump Administration's Efforts to Reshape the Federal Workforce

Deepa Shivaram initiates the conversation by outlining the Trump administration's significant moves to restructure the federal workforce within the first four months in office. These efforts include offering buyouts and early retirement packages to federal employees, exerting control over traditionally independent agencies, and attempting to dismantle certain government bodies.

Andrea Hsu provides a detailed breakdown of these changes:

• Dismantling Agencies: Agencies like USAID have been effectively dismantled, while attempts to close the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau have stalled due to lawsuits. "Now you have, you know, thousands of people who are on administrative leave... but they're still being paid," Hsu explains at [03:00].
• Layoffs and Resignations: Approximately 25,000 probationary employees were initially fired in February, only to be reinstated and partially re-fired following court orders. Deferred resignation offers have led to around 75,000 initial resignations at the Department of Agriculture, with numbers increasing in subsequent rounds ([02:30]).

Andrea Hsu emphasizes the volatile nature of these changes: "It's a lot of stuff in flux. It's a lot of limbo for federal workers and still a lot to come in terms of, you know, the president's efforts to make it a lot smaller than, you know, it has been for years" ([02:30]).

---

Impact on Federal Workers

The administration's approach has left federal employees in uncertain positions:

• Deferred Resignations: Many employees perceive the voluntary buyouts as coercive, feeling pressured to leave despite not wanting to. Hsu notes, "they say that they didn't want to leave, that they really kind of felt forced out by these threats" ([10:04]).
• Operational Disruptions: Agencies like the Department of Agriculture's Animal and Plant Health Inspection Service have seen significant staff reductions, raising concerns about the ability to manage agricultural diseases effectively. Hsu remarks, "US Farmers could be impacted if... there aren't as many people looking out for diseases and pests" ([12:00]).

Domenico Montanaro adds that the reduction in workforce could have tangible effects on the public: "they could be... killing off every year, and that sent egg prices soaring" ([12:00]).

---

Complications from Lawsuits

The administration's plans have faced numerous legal challenges, primarily centered around the authority to implement large-scale reorganizations and layoffs without congressional consent.

• Omnibus Lawsuit: A pivotal lawsuit, referred to as the "omnibus lawsuit," challenges the administration's authority to carry out these workforce changes. Hsu explains, "a federal judge has paused those reorganization plans at about 20 some agencies" ([04:49]).
• Supreme Court Involvement: The government has appealed to the Supreme Court to defend its restructuring efforts. Montanaro warns, "If you get to a place where the Supreme Court outright says, no, you have to put these people back in their jobs and they don't do it, then we are really at a place of constitutional crisis" ([06:54]).

These legal battles have created a state of limbo for federal workers, as many layoff and reorganization plans are currently on hold.

---

Role of Elon Musk in Government Restructuring

A notable figure in the administration's cost-cutting measures has been Elon Musk, appointed as the government's cost cutter with grand promises of saving "trillions of dollars."

• Unfulfilled Promises: Initially, Musk promised $2 trillion in savings, which was later revised to $1 trillion, and finally to $150 billion—a fraction of the original target. Montanaro reflects, "He didn't even achieve that. So it's been really interesting to see what the legacy of Doge actually is" ([14:24]).
• Impact on Federal Agencies: Despite Musk stepping down, Hsu points out that representatives aligned with his strategies remain in most agencies, continuing efforts to implement deep cuts and compiling extensive data whose future use remains uncertain ([15:30]).

Montanaro suggests Musk's tenure may have been intended to create instability: "Sometimes it's just disintegrated and there's people who don't wanna go back to work because they feel like this is not the secure job that I thought that I'd be getting. And that may have been the point all along" ([14:25]).

---

Long-Term Implications for Federal Workers and Public Perception

The administration's aggressive restructuring poses significant questions about the future landscape of federal employment and public trust in government institutions.

• Departmental Cuts: Agencies like Housing and Urban Development and the National Science Foundation are facing potential workforce reductions of over 50%, while the IRS and Small Business Administration could see cuts around 40% ([11:15]).
• Essential Services at Risk: Reduction in critical services could have cascading effects on public well-being. For instance, diminished staffing in agricultural inspection services may lead to increased vulnerability to disease outbreaks, directly affecting farmers and consumers alike ([12:00]).

Hsu underscores the precariousness of these changes: "It's really hard to know because things are so in flux" ([11:15]).

Montanaro highlights the disconnect between political rhetoric and practical governance: "There are a lot of ways that the federal government touches everybody's daily lives without people really realizing" ([13:00]).

The cumulative effect of these workforce changes could lead to diminished efficiency, increased operational risks, and a strained relationship between the government and its employees, potentially fostering a public perception of a destabilized federal workforce.

---

Conclusion

The NPR Politics Podcast episode "How Trump Has Reshaped The Federal Workforce" presents a comprehensive analysis of the Trump administration's ambitious and contentious efforts to transform the federal workforce. Through detailed discussions, the hosts illuminate the complexities, challenges, and potential ramifications of these changes. With ongoing legal battles and uncertain future outcomes, the administration's plans to streamline government operations remain a pivotal and debated aspect of its broader political legacy.

---

Notable Quotes:

• Andrea Hsu at [02:30]: "It's a lot of stuff in flux. It's a lot of limbo for federal workers and still a lot to come in terms of, you know, the president's efforts to make it a lot smaller than, you know, it has been for years."

• Domenico Montanaro at [06:54]: "If you get to a place where the Supreme Court outright says, no, you have to put these people back in their jobs and they don't do it, then we are really at a place of constitutional crisis."

• Andrea Hsu at [10:04]: "They say that they didn't want to leave, that they really kind of felt forced out by these threats."

• Domenico Montanaro at [14:24]: "He didn't even achieve that. So it's been really interesting to see what the legacy of Doge actually is."

---

This comprehensive summary encapsulates the critical discussions from the podcast episode, providing an insightful overview for listeners and readers seeking to understand the profound changes and their implications within the federal workforce under President Trump's administration.

Transcript

[NPR Announcer]

Imagine, if you will, a show from NPR that's not like npr, a show that focuses not on the important, but the stupid, which features stories about people smuggling animals in their pants, incompetent criminals, and ridiculous science studies. And call it Wait, Wait, Don't Tell Me, because the good names were taken. Listen to NPR's Wait, Wait, Don't Tell Me. Yes, that is what it is called. Wherever you get your podcasts.

[Jack]

Hey there. My name is Jack. I sitting on a boat in Gainesville, Florida, on Lake Newnan, watching the sunset and reading a book. There's probably, by my count, 10 or so Gators in the water around me with their heads up and the dragonflies are landing on them like it's no problem.

[Deepa Shivaram]

This podcast was recorded at 12:38pm on Thursday, May 29, 2025.

[Jack]

Things may have changed by the time you hear this, but I'll still be watching the sunset and there'll probably be more gators. Enjoy.

[Deepa Shivaram]

That might be my favorite timestamp.

[Domenico Montanaro]

I hope they've changed for the better.

[Deepa Shivaram]

Whatever Jack's vibes are, I want them. That was immaculate.

[Domenico Montanaro]

I would be so anxious sitting on that boat for a kid from Queens, I have to tell you, like, being surrounded by a bunch of gators in the swamp feels like my worst nightmare.

[Deepa Shivaram]

I think they're kind of cute.

[Domenico Montanaro]

I'm a fan until you get close to them, but you're also talking to somebody who saw a possum and thought it was a rat, so.

[Deepa Shivaram]

All right, Domenico, we need to get you out into the wild. Hey there. It's the NPR Politics podcast. I'm Deepa Shivaram. I cover the White House.

[Domenico Montanaro]

And I'm Domenico Montanaro, senior political editor and correspondent.

[Deepa Shivaram]

And NPR's labor correspondent Andrea Hsu is here with us today. Hey, Andrea.

[Andrea Hsu]

Hey.

[Deepa Shivaram]

All right, so today on the show, we want to talk about President Trump's efforts to change the way the federal government works. In just four months, the Trump administration has offered employees buyouts and early retirement, exerted control over some agencies that have long been considered independent and other agencies that aren't even part of the executive branch. So with all of that, Andrea, has the government actually been reshaped?

[Andrea Hsu]

Well, it certainly isn't what it looked like on January 20th when President Trump took office. But, you know, it hasn't really taken a new shape yet. It is still a work in progress with lots of lawsuits and getting in the way of what the president wants.

[Deepa Shivaram]

To do with the changes that have come. You know, what have they looked like? Like, what has been reshaped so far?

[Andrea Hsu]

Yeah. Well, in some cases you have entire agencies that have been dismantled, like USAID is pretty much dismantled. There are others that Trump has tried to shutter, like the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, where because of lawsuits, people are still on the payroll, but it's not clear that people are actually getting anything done. Now you have, you know, thousands of people who are on administrative leave, meaning they're not going to work. They don't even have their equipment in many cases, but they're still being paid. And then in other places, you have people who are going to work and, you know, may even be in meetings. But I'm hearing from them that they're not really doing a whole lot of work or they haven't been given new assignments because there is this expectation that they could be laid off. There are some people who have been fired. You know, back in February, agencies fired around 25,000 or so probationary employees. These were typically newer employees, but then they were reinstated under court order, and then that court order was lifted and a smaller number of them had been fired again. So you do have some people that were fired. And then there's a bunch of people who have gotten, I mean, Thousands more than 10,000 people who have gotten layoff notices, but that's now on hold because of a court order. The largest group of people who have actually left the government who aren't working anymore are the people who took the deferred resignation offer that this offer to quit their jobs now and still get paid through September. So we also don't have good numbers for that. We know in the first round, the government said about 75,000 people took it. In the second round, a bunch of agencies offered it a second time, and a whole lot more people took it. At the US Department of Agriculture, for example, more than 15,000 people, around 15% of the workforce have taken this resignation offer. And about a quarter of those took it in the first round and three quarters took in the second round. So that's kind of the big picture. It's a lot of stuff in flux. It's a lot of limbo for federal workers and still a lot to come in terms of, you know, the president's efforts to make it a lot smaller than, you know, it has been for years.

[Deepa Shivaram]

And you're saying the lawsuits are complicating some of this. Can you talk to me about why that's an added complication?

[Andrea Hsu]

There are so many different lawsuits happening. And, I mean, I'll start with one of the big ones, which was called the omnibus lawsuit because it covers so many different agencies. Some labor unions and some nonprofits and some local governments sued, basically saying President Trump doesn't have the authority to carry out this huge reorganization and these mass layoffs in the federal government without the cooperation of Congress. So a federal judge has paused those reorganization plans at about 20 some agencies. The government has challenged that. They've asked the Supreme Court to step in. So a lot of that is on pause right now. But what that means is that a lot of people are in limbo. They don't really know what the future is going to look like. Agencies had already issued layoff notices or reduction in force notices to some people, like at Health and Human Services, we're talking CDC and the FDA and the National Institutes of Health. You know, around 10,000 people had received these layoff notices back at the end of March, beginning of April. They were supposed to be formally separated at the beginning of June, but that's now on hold.

[Deepa Shivaram]

So Domenico, at the same time that all of this is going on, these lawsuits are complicating everything. I want to point out this is an administration that hasn't exactly been very deferential to the courts thus far. So even if the courts are saying, hey, you've tried to reduce this XYZ agency, but you have to put a pause on it, does that actually hold any weight?

[Domenico Montanaro]

Well, I mean, this is a president that wants to test the limits, right? He wants to be able to try to consolidate power as much as possible within the executive branch. And he wants to be able to push as much as he possibly can to the supreme court, which has a 6:3 conservative super majority. And Trump wants to see just how much he can possibly push. What are the guardrails? The Supreme Court will certainly lay that out. If you get to a place where the Supreme Court outright says, no, you have to put these people back in their jobs and they don't do it, then we are really at a place of constitutional crisis.

[Deepa Shivaram]

And I will point out, too, I don't know if we've underscored this point enough, the president and the Trump administration taking the control of reshaping the government. I mean, they are essentially taking. What is Congress's authority in that process?

[Domenico Montanaro]

Well, there's a lot of what Congress has clearly authorized, funding for different agencies, funding for different programs. Remember, Congress is supposed to control the strings and the president's supposed to control the sword. So Congress and the president are supposed to work together on these things. But there's been a lot that Trump has tried to go around Congress on and that's what's really being tested in the courts, to see whether or not he has the authority or doesn't have the authority as it relates to Congress.

[Deepa Shivaram]

All right, time for a quick break and more in a moment.

[Tonya Moseley]

I'm Tonya Moseley, co host of FRESH air. At a time of sound bites and short attention spans, our show is all about the deep dive. We do long form interviews with people behind the best in film, books, tv, music and journalism. Here, our guests open up about their process and their lives in ways you've never heard before. Listen to the FRESH AIR podcast from NPR and whyy.

[NPR Advertiser]

This message comes from Saatva. Spring cleaning can be good for your home and your mind. It can boost your mood, sharpen your focus and fuel productivity. Another way to do all that Sleeping well Voted best luxury mattress by sleepfoundation.org Every Saatva is handcrafted for a great night's sleep and they cost far less than retail. Save $200 on $1,000 or more at saatva.com NPR.

[Life Kit Host]

Great Conversation makes for a great party. But how do you ask the questions that really make the room come alive? Well, here at Life Kit, we've got you.

[Andrea Hsu]

What is a path you almost took but didn't?

[Life Kit Host]

On our latest episode, how to ask the magical questions that'll make your party sparkle. Listen to the Life Kit podcast from npr.

[Deepa Shivaram]

And we're back. Domenico, I want to kick things off here with a very basic question. When President Trump said he was going to, you know, reshape the federal government, do all of these cuts, what was his goal?

[Domenico Montanaro]

Well, I mean, if you remember, even Back to his 2016 campaign, he talked about the swamp and how there was a deep state that was out to get conservatives. And he certainly had enough things that he could point to over the last 10 years where he tried to say this is an example of it. Whether or not it was legitimate or not, he would say that these things show weaponization of government or show people trying to stand in the way of getting things done for the MAGA movement. So part of this is just quote, unquote, dismantling the deep state. And part of how they felt they could do that is through this idea that you create enough chaos, you create enough trauma for people that they don't wanna go work for the federal government, that they don't wind up being people who are standing in the way of what Trump wants to do. So they're really trying to root out people they feel would slow them down yeah.

[Andrea Hsu]

And a lot of the people I have spoken to who took the voluntary deferred resignation vaccination program, they say that they didn't want to leave, that they really kind of felt forced out by these threats. Like, you know, this is a pretty good offer. If you don't take this, you could be laid off anyway. And so I think that it's part of the President's vision of smaller government. But all this talk about, you know, rooting out waste and fraud and, you know, inefficiency and laziness, I'm. This really struck a lot of employees as, you know, do I actually really want to work for a government that wants to put me in trauma?

[Domenico Montanaro]

It kind of reminds me of like traveling somewhere and they're like, hey, it'd be a really good deal on a timeshare, but if you don't act now, you know that thing is going to be gone.

[Andrea Hsu]

Yeah. And people had so little information that, you know, they really were left trying to think about, okay, what's going to do the least harm to me. And oftentimes they said they made these life changing decisions based on rumors.

[Deepa Shivaram]

Based on rumors. Right. Not enough information. And also, this was happening like so early in the administration. Right?

[Andrea Hsu]

Yes. End of January when they were first offered this deferred resignation deal. And then a lot of them were offered it again in April. But it's only been four months since Trump came back to Washington.

[Deepa Shivaram]

In your conversations that you've had with federal workers, people who have taken these buyouts and those who have maybe stayed, what is your sense of some of the long term implications for federal workers? I think, but also just for the general public and their perception of federal workers in the federal workforce?

[Andrea Hsu]

Yeah, I mean, it's really hard to know because things are so in flux as we've been talking about. But the layoff plans that have sort of surfaced are really quite dramatic. You have departments like the Housing and Urban Development and the National Science foundation where leaders have forecasted cuts of 50% or more of employees. The IRS, the Small Business Administration, cuts of 40%. And I've talked to a bunch of people at USDA who worked for this Animal and Plant Health Inspection Service. These are the people who protect US agriculture from disease and pests. They had about 1300 out of 8000 people leave through the deferred resignation program. And, you know, while the USDA says that the Agriculture Secretary, Brooke Rollins, is not going to compromise the critical work of the department, I have, you know, longtime veterans of USDA worry that US Farmers could be impacted if, you know, there aren't as many people looking out for diseases and pests and, you know, responding to those things quickly. And the impact on these farmers will trickle down to the public through hyper. You think about what happened with avian flu. You know, tens of millions of chickens have had to be killed off every year, and that sent egg prices soaring. So beyond avian flu, they're worried about all these other very scary foreign animal diseases that could spread through herds of livestock.

[Domenico Montanaro]

It's been really something to see a lot of senators and congresspeople who were in favor of a lot of these cuts saying, government's just too big. We've got to reduce the size of government. And then when things like tornadoes happen in their states and they that there were entire offices of noaa, the national oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, for those little places to be shut down and suddenly you can't tell the weather. They're like, oh, not in my backyard. This isn't what we wanted here. So there's a lot of ways that the federal government touches everybody's daily lives without people really realizing. And it's really easy to say in an amorphous way that the government's just too big and that it should be reduced.

[Deepa Shivaram]

Right. And it's one of those things where, like, we probably on a regular day to day level don't realize how many government agencies, government workers are touching, you know, every aspect of our lives. We should know also, the person who was the, you know, figurehead spearheading a lot of these efforts was Elon Musk. Right. And Musk said he was leaving his government service this week. President Trump said that Musk would be the government's cost cutter. He would save the country trillions of dollars. This was something he said over and over again. You know, Musk was even in the Oval Office multiple times with Donald Trump. I wonder, Domenico, if you could speak to as this era of Elon Musk in the Trump administration comes to an end, you know, what was his role in all of this and how will his legacy here be remembered?

[Andrea Hsu]

Maybe.

[Domenico Montanaro]

Well, it's really interesting because you've got Elon Musk, the world's wealthiest person, coming into this administration, promising big cuts, $2 trillion in savings. Then it was $1 trillion in savings. Then it was 150 billion dollars in savings, which according to the federal government's budget is basically a rounding error. And he didn't even achieve that. So it's been really interesting to see what the legacy of Doge actually is. What it actually accomplished beyond kind of creating chaos and this trauma that we've been talking about, maybe some of that has been the actual point of it all. And it certainly Trump was able to use Musk as somebody who could do the unpopular things, you know, break some China and see where the chips sort of fall. And, you know, sometimes that meant breaking stuff that they need. So they're like, oh, let's glue this back together and see if we can get that person to come back to work. And then sometimes it's just disintegrated and there's people who don't wanna go back to work because they feel like this is not the secure job that I thought that I'd be getting. And that may have been the point all along.

[Andrea Hsu]

I would say that, you know, even with him gone, he has installed these DOGE representatives in most agencies who are still there, you know, ordering people to come up with plans to make these deep cuts. I will say, though, beyond just the changes that DOGE is doing, they have sucked a lot of data out of the federal government. We don't know exactly where or what what they're going to do with it, but we do know that a lot of data has been captured and we just don't know what they're going to do with that. And I think that's a really big question for the future.

[Deepa Shivaram]

Interesting. All right, Andrea, thanks so much for joining us.

[Andrea Hsu]

Thanks for having me.

[Deepa Shivaram]

That's all for today. I'm Deepa Shivaram. I cover the White House.

[Domenico Montanaro]

I'm Domenico Montanaro, senior political political editor and correspondent.

[Deepa Shivaram]

And thank you for listening to the NPR Politics Podcast.

[Pop Culture Happy Hour Host]

Know that fizzy feeling you get when you read something really good? Watch the movie everyone's been talking about or catch the show that the Internet can't get over? At the Pop Culture Happy Hour Podcast, we chase that feeling four times a week. We'll serve you recommendations and commentary on the buzziest movies, tv, music and more, from lowbrow to highbrow to the stuff in between. Catch the Pop Culture Happy Hour Podcast from npr.

[Up First Host]

A lot of short daily news podcasts focus on just one story, but right now you probably need more on up first from NPR, we bring you three of the world's top headlines every day in under 15 minutes because no one story can capture all that's happening in this big crazy world of ours on any given morning. Listen now to the Upverse podcast from NPR.

[Life Kit Host]

As NPR's daily economics podcast, the indicator has been asking businesses how tariffs are affecting their bottom line.

[Andrea Hsu]

I paid 800,000 today.

[Domenico Montanaro]

You paid $800,000 in tariffs today?

[Andrea Hsu]

Yes.

[Domenico Montanaro]

Wow.

[Life Kit Host]

And what that means for your bottom line? Listen to the indicator from Planet Money. Find us wherever you get your podcasts.