By year’s end, the civilian federal workforce is projected to fall from about 2.4 million to roughly 2.1 million employees, according to Office of Personnel Management Director Scott Kupor. The cuts—championed by budget chief Russell Vought and the White House initiative dubbed the Department of Government Efficiency, which Elon Musk led for the first four months—have targeted agencies overseeing health, the environment, education, and financial regulation while expanding immigration enforcement.
At 2:33 p.m. Mountain Time on February 27, 2025, atmospheric scientist Natasha Miles learned the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration job she had just relocated for would not proceed. As she approached Boulder, Colorado, an email informed her the position “no longer met the needs of the administration.” Her story is one of many reported by The Nation amid a rapid contraction of the federal workforce following the inauguration.
The scale and pace
- Scope: OPM Director Scott Kupor has said the non‑military federal workforce is expected to shrink by about 300,000 in 2025, from roughly 2.4 million to about 2.1 million—one of the largest single‑year reductions since World War II. Most departures have come via incentives and buyouts, with a minority through dismissals, Kupor said in interviews and agency updates.
- Leadership: Budget director Russell Vought, a principal author of the conservative policy blueprint often referred to as Project 2025, has been key to the downsizing effort. Elon Musk, serving as a special government employee, led the Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) through late May before stepping back; the White House has characterized his role as advisory and time‑limited, while acknowledging his prominent involvement early on.
Labor and civil service protections
- Union rights: After an early‑term executive order invoked national‑security exemptions to sharply curtail collective bargaining across dozens of agencies, appellate panels in Washington, D.C., and the Ninth Circuit allowed the policy to take effect while litigation proceeds. The Center for American Progress estimates the orders ultimately stripped bargaining rights from more than 1 million federal workers. Unions call the move the largest rollback of federal labor rights in U.S. history; the administration says it is necessary for mission agility. (The quoted assessment and numbers are from CAP.)
- Job status changes: The administration revived and expanded a version of the late‑term 2020 “Schedule F” effort—now rebranded in OPM materials—to reclassify tens of thousands of policy‑influencing roles with fewer civil‑service protections. OPM says the target cohort is a small share of the workforce; unions and good‑government groups warn it politicizes career roles and enables at‑will firing.
Agency impacts
- USAID: Foreign‑aid operations were dramatically narrowed. In March, Secretary of State Marco Rubio said roughly 83% of USAID programs were being terminated, with surviving activities moved under the State Department. Health economist Brooke Nichols of Boston University developed an impact tracker estimating that by late spring, interrupted programs had already contributed to large numbers of preventable child and adult deaths. By summer, her running estimate exceeded half a million global deaths; other peer‑reviewed projections warned of more than 14 million additional deaths by 2030 if deep cuts persist. The State Department has disputed some estimates and says critical waivers kept parts of PEPFAR and other programs operating, but courts also ordered portions of frozen payments to resume.
- NOAA and CDC: Two waves of probationary‑status layoffs at NOAA—affecting hundreds of forecasters and researchers—triggered warnings from scientists and lawmakers about degraded weather and climate services. At HHS, thousands of probationary employees, including about 1,300 at the CDC, received termination notices before some reinstatements followed public and legal pushback.
- CFPB: After Russell Vought—also serving as acting CFPB head—ordered a stop‑work and attempted to cut off the bureau’s Fed‑backed funding, the National Treasury Employees Union sued. A federal judge issued an injunction requiring the reinstatement of probationary and term staff and barring further mass firings while the case proceeds. The administration maintains that agency activities continued within legal constraints; employee groups say enforcement work stalled.
- Public media and global broadcasting: The White House directed cuts to federal support for public broadcasting, followed by legislation rescinding CPB appropriations. Separately, the U.S. Agency for Global Media pursued sweeping reductions at Voice of America and sister outlets; a series of court orders have alternately blocked and permitted aspects of those moves, leaving the broadcasters in limbo.
Human and economic toll
- Personal accounts: The Nation documented firings or stalled careers for workers like Miles; “Adrian M.,” a Black CDC communications specialist terminated during a wave of probationary cuts; and U.S. Forest Service veteran Dan Meleason, who said of his dismissal, “It’s not what I expected when I re‑signed up to work for the people of the United States.”
- Disparate impacts: Black workers are heavily represented in public‑sector roles. Federal data show Black unemployment rose to 7.5% in August 2025, up more than a percentage point year‑over‑year. Analyses reported by major outlets, drawing on Labor Department microdata, found that about 319,000 Black women left the labor force between February and July, underscoring a sharp, uneven hit.
Courts and constraints
- Courts have checked and enabled different parts of the agenda. District courts ordered the government to restart certain frozen USAID payments and blocked mass shutdown‑era firings; appeals courts allowed union curbs to take effect pending trial. The Supreme Court has intervened in both directions—at one point allowing aid payments to resume, and more recently granting emergency relief that let the administration temporarily limit SNAP funding during the shutdown—leaving core disputes over appropriations, agency independence, and civil‑service rules to ongoing litigation.
What’s next
- As 2025 ends, the administration continues to press agency downsizing and reclassification through a combination of executive action, OPM rulemaking, and budget maneuvers. Unions, states, and affected workers are challenging those steps in multiple courts. For workers like Miles—and the communities that depend on federal services—the outcomes of those legal fights will determine how far the 120‑year‑old professional civil service is remade, and how much of this year’s contraction becomes permanent.
