US Agencies Offer Staff new Buyouts Ahead Of Trump’s Layoff Deadline

Agencies using lump-sum payments, early retirement program to cut federal workers

March 13 is deadline to submit plans for large-scale layoffs

Workers would get buyout payment of as much as $25,000

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Buyout program less vulnerable to legal challenge

By Alexandra Alper, Tim Reid, Marisa Taylor and Nathan Layne

March 11 (Reuters) – Multiple federal government companies are turning to early retirement programs to minimize headcount as they scramble to meet President Donald Trump’s Thursday due date for them to submit plans for a 2nd round of mass layoffs.

The Office of Personnel Management, the Social Security Administration, and the Department of Health and Human Services, including its Food and Drug Administration, are amongst the firms which have used lump-sum payments of approximately $25,000 before tax to employees who accept leave their tasks.

The buyout offers, combined with another program that relieves eligibility requirements for early retirement, are being embraced as a lower-friction method to help satisfy the Thursday due date, human resource professionals at several federal companies informed Reuters.

The Trump administration has actually been grappling with myriad claims after it fired thousands of probationary employees in a very first wave of mass layoffs and dismantled entire departments like USAID, the U.S. humanitarian help firm, and the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, which protects Americans against unscrupulous lenders.

All U.S. government companies have actually been ordered to come up with large-scale layoff plans by Thursday as part of Trump’s extraordinary project to upgrade the government. One of his leading advisers, the tech billionaire Elon Musk, is leading that effort with his so-called Department of Government Efficiency.

The General Services Administration, which handles the government’s property portfolio, is likewise seeking approval to use the buyout payments to workers, according to an email sent out by its acting head to staff on Monday and seen by Reuters. The Securities and Exchange Commission has actually currently benefits of as much as $50,000, Reuters reported.

Personnel and public governance professionals said the appeal of the buyout program, called voluntary separation reward payments, is that it is voluntary and less susceptible to legal challenges. It likewise needs workers who have accepted the deal to repay the cash if they take another federal government task within 5 years.

“If your method is to get as many individuals out the door voluntarily, that reduces the risk of court orders and opposition to you in the long run,” stated Don Moynihan, a public policy professor at the University of Michigan.

OPM STILL WAITING FOR PLANS

Only a couple of agencies have telegraphed by means of media leaks the number of staff members they prepare to cut in the 2nd stage of layoffs. They 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.

Despite the looming due date, no firm has actually yet sent its job-cutting strategy to OPM, the federal government’s human resources department that is collating the information, an individual familiar with the matter informed Reuters. OPM declined to comment.

OPM itself has used lump-sum payments to some 650 OPM employees, according to another individual with knowledge of the matter. Employees were offered until March 12 to react.

At the General Services Administration, staff members were notified on Monday that OPM had actually greenlit a strategy to use an early retirement program to all qualified workers.

“I motivate each of you to consider your choices as we progress,” GSA Acting Administrator Stephen Ehikian wrote in an e-mail seen by Reuters. “The new GSA will be slimmer, more efficient and laser-focused on efficiency and high-value outcomes.”

On March 10, the HR department of the Fda sent an e-mail to all its 19,000 staff members revealing a Friday, March 14, deadline to opt into a VSIP. Those who accept would have to retire by April 19.

“There will be no extensions,” specifies the email, evaluated by Reuters and signed by Tania Tse, director of the FDA’s Office of Human Capital Management.

Late on Monday, HHS sweetened its previous VSIP deal by including that workers accepting it would get two months of complete pay in addition to the bonus, according to a copy of the email seen by Reuters.

Steve Lenkart, executive director of the National Federation of Federal Employees, a union which represents 110,000 federal government workers, stated the Trump administration was using “a genuine program to more damage the abilities of agencies to finish their objective.”

OPM decreased to respond to Lenkart’s remarks. (Reporting by Alexandra Alper, Tim Reid, Marisa Taylor and Nathan Layne; Editing by Ross Colvin and Daniel Wallis)