- The Department of Education announced Tuesday that it’s firing over 1,300 employees.
- This will slash the agency’s workforce in half, a senior administration official said.
- The official said that these terminations will not impact student aid or grant disbursements.
The Department of Education said on Tuesday that it’s firing over 1,300 employees, leaving the agency with just over half the number of workers that were in place before President Donald Trump’s took office for his second term.
A senior administration official confirmed to reporters that the department is beginning to send termination notices to 1,315 employees beginning at 6 p.m. EST on Tuesday and that the department’s focus with this reduction in force was eliminating full teams the agency deemed redundant or unnecessary.
The official said that of the 4,133 total staff at the department, 259 took the administration’s deferred resignation offer, and 313 accepted the department’s $25,000 voluntary buyout. About 2,183 employees will remain at the agency after these terminations, the official said.
Fired employees will have 90 days until they are officially terminated, and they will receive full pay and benefits during that time, along with severance payments to follow. These terminations are in addition to the 63 probationary employees who were already fired from the agency, the official said, and they will not impact key functions like the administration of federal student aid, grants for special needs students, and civil rights investigations.
“Today’s reduction in force reflects the Department of Education’s commitment to efficiency, accountability, and ensuring that resources are directed where they matter most: to students, parents, and teachers,” Secretary of Education Linda McMahon said in a statement. “I appreciate the work of the dedicated public servants and their contributions to the Department. This is a significant step toward restoring the greatness of the United States education system.”
The department said that terminated employees will be placed on administrative leave beginning March 21 until the reduction in force is complete on June 9.
One Education Department employee told BI that the news “makes me sick.”
“I’m just waiting for 6 p.m ET to roll around to see if I get an email,” the employee said. “Of course there will be no rhyme or reason to it. They will indiscriminately fire people without regard to tenure, program, project, performance, impact, or any other useful metric.”
The terminations are coming just over a week after McMahon outlined the “final mission” for the department, which she said would include removing “bureaucratic barriers” within the agency. They signal a step toward President Donald Trump’s overall goal to eliminate the Department of Education altogether.
Following news of the terminations, the American Federation of Government Employees local chapter president, Sheria Smith, said in a statement that the union will “fight these draconian cuts.”
“We will not stand idly by while this regime pulls the wool over the eyes of the American people,” Smith said. “We will state the facts. Every employee at the U.S. Department of Education lives in your communities — we are your neighbors, your friends, your family. And we have spent our careers supporting services that you rely on.”
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