US Education Department to Cut Half its Staff As Trump Eyes Its

Department offices ordered shut down until Thursday

Agencies cut employees utilizing lump-sum payments, early retirement

Thursday is deadline to submit plans for large-scale layoffs

(Adds new federal government report on incorrect payments, paragraphs 12-14)

By Timothy Gardner, Tim Reid, Alexandra Alper and Marisa Taylor

WASHINGTON, March 11 (Reuters) – The U.S. Department of Education said on Tuesday it would lay off nearly half its staff, a possible precursor to closing altogether, as government agencies scrambled to fulfill President Donald Trump’s due date to submit strategies for a second round of mass layoffs.

The terminations are part of the department’s “last objective,” it said in a press release, pointing to Trump’s vow to remove the department, which manages $1.6 trillion in college loans, enforces civil liberties laws in schools and supplies federal financing for needy districts.

Asked on Fox News whether the firings would result in the department’s dismantling, Secretary of Education Linda McMahon said “yes,” including that doing so “was the president’s required.” The layoffs would leave the department with 2,183 workers, below 4,133 when Trump took office in January.

Before announcing the layoffs, the agency ordered offices in the Washington location near staff from Tuesday evening through Wednesday, according to an internal notice seen by Reuters. An Education Department spokesperson did not immediately react to concerns about the nature of the security problems triggering the closures.

Similar closures served as a precursor to shuttering the headquarters of the U.S. Agency for International Development, the humanitarian aid company, and the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, which secures Americans versus deceitful lending institutions.

The layoffs are the newest step in Trump’s sweeping effort to downsize the federal government, led by the world’s richest person Elon Musk and his Department of Government Efficiency. DOGE has actually cut more than 100,000 tasks across the 2.3 million-member federal civilian bureaucracy, frozen most foreign help and canceled countless programs and agreements, in spite of dozens of suits challenging the legality of those relocations.

DOGE’s blunt-force technique has frustrated numerous White House officials and Republican legislators, some of whom have actually confronted mad constituents at city center. Trump told department heads recently that they, not Musk, have the last word on staffing, his first notable public relocate to restrain the Tesla CEO.

All U.S. federal government agencies have actually been ordered to come up with large-scale layoff plans by Thursday, setting up the next stage of Trump’s cost-cutting campaign. Several firms have actually offered employees payments to retire early to fulfill Trump’s need.

Affected Education Department staff members will be put on administrative leave beginning on March 21, the department stated.

The union representing more than 2,800 department employees said it would fight the “heavy-handed cuts.”

“What is clear from the previous weeks of mass firings, chaos, and uncontrolled unprofessionalism is that this routine has no respect for the countless workers who have committed their careers to serve their fellow Americans,” said Sheria Smith, president of the American Federation of Government Employees Local 252.

Trump and Musk have argued that the federal government is wasteful and bloated. DOGE claims it has actually conserved $105 billion in cuts, however it has just openly documented a fraction of those cost savings, and its accounting has actually been plagued by mistakes.

The federal government reported an approximated $162 billion in inappropriate payments in 2024, according to a U.S. Government Accountability Office yearly report launched on Tuesday. The vast bulk were overpayments, the report said. Total federal expenses topped $6.75 trillion because financial year, according to the Congressional Budget Office.

The overall inappropriate payments figure was down dramatically from 2023’s $236 billion, the GAO said.

EARLY RETIREMENT OFFERS

Other firms have provided lump-sum payments of approximately $25,000 before tax to workers who accept leave their tasks. Among these are the Office of Personnel Management, the Social Security Administration and the Department of Health and Human Services, including its Fda.

The buyout offers, integrated with another program that reduces eligibility requirements for early retirement, are being embraced as a lower-friction method to help fulfill the Thursday deadline, human resources experts at several federal companies informed Reuters.

The Trump administration has been coming to grips with myriad lawsuits after it fired thousands of probationary workers in a very first wave of mass layoffs and basically dismantled whole departments like USAID and CFPB.

The General Services Administration, which handles the government’s property portfolio, is also looking for approval to provide the buyout payments to workers, according to an e-mail sent by its acting head to personnel on Monday and seen by Reuters. The GSA might not be reached for remark outside of U.S. organization hours. The Securities and Exchange Commission has already provided bonus offers of up to $50,000, Reuters reported.

Personnels and public governance professionals said the appeal of the buyout program is that it is voluntary and less susceptible to legal difficulties. It also requires workers who have accepted the offer to repay the cash if they take another government task within 5 years.

Only a couple of firms have actually telegraphed how numerous workers they plan to cut in the 2nd phase of layoffs. These include the Department of Veterans Affairs, which is intending to cut more than 80,000 workers, and the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, which is planning to cut 1,029 staff.

OPM itself has used lump-sum payments to some 650 of its staff members, according to another person with understanding of the matter. Employees were provided until March 12 to respond.

On Monday, the HR department of the Fda sent an e-mail to all 19,000 staff members announcing a Friday, March 14, deadline for a buyout program. Those who accept would have to retire by April 19.

Late on Monday, HHS sweetened its previous deal by adding 2 months of full pay in addition to the reward, according to a copy of the e-mail seen by Reuters. HHS might not be reached for comment outside of normal U.S. organization hours. (Reporting by Timothy Gardner, Alexandra Alper, Tim Reid and Marisa Taylor, additional reporting by Nathan Layne and Kanishka Singh, composing by and Joseph Ax; Editing by Scott Malone, David Gregorio and Muralikumar Anantharaman)