Content warning: Graphic descriptions of death.
This week, the Trump administration offered buyouts to roughly 2 million federal employees. If accepted, the administration says employees who resign by Feb. 6 will not be expected to continue working and will receive salary until Sept. 30.
Still, as of now, it is unclear whether Trump can offer such sweeping proposals without authorization from Congress. Sen. Tim Kaine warned workers not to resign. "The president has no authority to make that offer. There's no budget line item to pay people who are not showing up for work," he said. "If you accept that offer and resign, he'll stiff you, just like he stiffed the contractors."
Trump's buyout offer is just one in a series of controversial actions since taking office — which include attempting to freeze federal funding (a move later blocked by a judge), seeking to end birthright citizenship, placing all federal DEI staff on leave, firing independent government watchdogs, and demanding loyalty pledges from new hires.
With broad changes underway, people want to know how federal employees are faring. A thread on Reddit asked, "Those who currently work in the US federal government, what's the current mood like?"
Here's everything they shared:
1. "IRS agent here. Not great, Bob. Not. Great."
2. "Government contractor here. Nobody knows what's going on. We're waiting for an adult to unscramble this word salad. Are we defending the Constitution or gutting the 14th Amendment? Are we freezing federal hiring or creating an External Revenue Department? Go to a circus, expect to see clowns."
3. "It's pretty grim. Most of the stuff is illegal, but no one knows what that means now. A new email was set up to communicate directly with federal workers. This week, one asked everyone to quit (not a 'buyout' in any way). They are obviously written by someone without experience in the government or knowing how the budget works."
"The return to office is going to cost taxpayers millions or billions. Less than 50% of federal workers are even eligible for telework. The federal civilian workforce (some 2 million Americans) is only a fraction of the budget. That will go up. The idea isn't to save money; it is to destroy the federal workforce and checks and balances."
4. "I worked my entire career to get to CDC. Literally halfway through my bachelor's degree, it was my goal. I worked my ass off at an Ivy League school, did AmeriCorps Vista for basically no pay, got into one of the best universities for a master's of public health, and had my eye set on a specific fellowship and worked to it and got it. Every decision I've ever made professionally and academically was to get to the CDC. And this f**ker comes in and wants to kick us out."
5. "Health and Human Services, bleak. This mess has brought my team together, as we are sharing memes and information through text, so that's nice. Despite what this administration thinks, all we want to do is our jobs. Help out our stakeholders, protect human and animal health, and provide service to the public. But, we are now sitting in meetings, having to decipher all the memos and executive orders and trying to prevent panic. Civil service can be demoralizing on a bad day, but this has gone above and beyond."
6. "Angry and very compelled to stay at my post, uphold my oath of office, and stick it to the new administration. They aren't running me out without a fight."
7. "You know that scene in Titanic where the band plays as the ship sinks…?"
8. "Despair. It sucks to be working hard and meeting all your performance goals, but the people you work for are convinced (with no evidence) that you are a lazy piece of shit. They've openly admitted to wanting to make us so miserable we quit, and it's like every day there is some crazy new idea for how to punish us. I'm having a hard time imagining living through the next four years of this, and I'm seriously depressed about it."
"I know someone is probably going to say, 'Why don't you just quit?' The problem is I actually love what I do and the small team I work with. It feels like a hostile takeover. And I'm in a highly specialized field that isn't going to be able to absorb the number of workers that will be looking for a job after all this."
9. "USPS. Waiting for the eye to look upon us more directly."
10. "Air Traffic Controller here. We've been understaffed and underpaid for years. No hope of higher pay until 2029 at the earliest now. Can't do anything about it even though we have a union, and 5% of the GDP flies through the skies daily. What should be a good, upper-middle-class job that you'd never dream of leaving is instead lower-middle-class and nearly impossible to work around thanks to the schedule. I've seen more people quit than I ever expected, and I'm sure things will only get worse."
11. "Department of Defense. Everything is business as usual for now because the military needs the support. I’m in a very conservative office environment, and so far, everyone seems just fine while I am secretly freaking the fuck out."
12. "It’s not good. Russ Vought, the [nominee] for the Office of Management and Budget and one of the guys who has contributed to many of the executive orders, was [reportedly] caught on camera a few months ago saying, 'We want to put [federal employees] in trauma.' Well, he’s succeeded. I’m a 14-year federal employee, and I’m feeling pretty traumatized right now."
13. "I work in Congress for a Democrat member. The amount of calls we got today was staggering. It's hard because we're literally getting the guidance as everyone else is, so while people ask us to do something or ask if something will be affected, we're scrambling to find out for ourselves. It's not a great look, and we're only a week in."
14. "Social Security Administration (SSA). We've been under a hiring freeze since October due to the continuing resolution. We are so understaffed. They think we can do the same amount, or more, with even fewer employees. What a joke. We have had people complaining for years about how long everything takes with the SSA, and it's about to get so much worse. I'm looking into a few certifications to make myself marketable in the event I'm let go. I don't see this ending well, but I'm not leaving voluntarily."
15. "I'm senior enlisted in the Navy; everyone is just kinda in shock with all the changes. No one I've spoken to is happy that vaccine deniers are being offered to come back in with back pay. It's a slap in the face to those of us who followed orders (and science). It also sets a godawful precedent. The Jan. 6 pardons feel like a straight betrayal."
16. "Super degrading. I've worked shitty low-paying jobs my entire life. Through sweat, equity, and hard work, I finally got a well-paying job in the government I was proud of. A place where I could work hard, serve my country and its people, and finally climb a ladder to higher success. Now, it feels like it's all being stripped away from me."
"The decades of precedence that government jobs offer security feel like they're gone, and the emails we've been getting from the Office of Personnel Management (OPM) are unprofessional and condescending. They treat us like elementary school kids. Worse yet, my MAGA coworkers feel like it's a worthy price to pay 'for the greater good.' It's incredibly depressing."
17. "It's worse on the inside than can even be expressed by the media. We have fully lost our democracy to Trump and the broligarchs. I do not expect an election in 2028, but instead, I expect a national emergency or another avenue to suspend the election. The 'Supreme Leaders,' I mean the Supreme Court, will do nothing to stop the hostile takeover. Actions are being taken by non-governmental people and organizations on behalf of 'Dear Leader,' and much is blatantly illegal."
"As a Fed, we cannot speak up, speak out, or even exercise our First Amendment rights under this administration. Pledge loyalty or get out. Yes, that came to all of us Feds this afternoon via email from 'OPM,' although it's clear the messages were generated outside of OPM. Dipshits don't even bother scrubbing the metadata from the files when they post them, so easy to confirm."
18. "I have one coworker that voted for Trump that's freaking out about us probably having to return to the office because he's nearly blind and has to take an Uber to work during his weekly in-office day. Without me egging him on, he admitted he was happier under Biden and said he doesn't like Musk anymore (of course, it took him being personally affected to reach that point)."
And lastly:
19. "For 22 years, I have worked as a federal wildland firefighter. I have literally bled in service to this nation and its people and to preserve its natural resources. I have had guns pulled on me by white supremacists and pissed off private citizens. I spend months at a time away from my family and friends and have missed many once-in-a-lifetime events."
(Cont'd) "I have pulled dead children from car wrecks, decomposed addicts from homes, homeless men from dumpsters, and buried dozens of pets before their owners could see their charred remains. I have delivered two babies, saved a bus full of tourists from freezing to death in the Sierra Nevada mountains, and changed the flat tires of many stranded motorists. There are probably 40+ people who are alive and contributing to society today because of the actions of my coworkers and me."
"America elected Trump after he said federal workers are a threat to their financial freedoms. Now, he demands that I achieve a higher performance level to keep this job. I will also have to prove that I will be more loyal to him than the US Constitution. So, I'm going to drive a garbage truck, make six figures, listen to my backlog of audiobooks, and be home every night with my family. Someone else can take over all that shit mentioned above. Fuck Trump, and fuck you if you voted for him. If I'm going to be labeled an enemy to America? I might as well own it. That's how I feel."
What are your thoughts? Let us know in the comments.
Note: Some responses have been edited for length and/or clarity.
