GSA Rehires Hundreds After DOGE Cuts Spark Chaos
Former employees are called back as critics blast costly downsizing led by Elon Musk and the Department of Government Efficiency.
The General Services Administration (GSA) has asked hundreds of former employees—who were removed during a cost-cutting campaign led by the Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE)—to return to their jobs.
The department had targeted the GSA, which employed around 12,000 staff at the beginning of Trump’s term, as a primary agency for downsizing, citing waste and corruption. Since March, thousands of employees left through voluntary resignation and early retirement programs, while a small group of DOGE staff remained at the Washington headquarters, pressing ahead with plans to terminate nearly half of the 7,500 federal lease contracts under the supervision of Elon Musk, who was leading the initiative at that time.
According to an internal memo obtained by the Associated Press, employees overseeing federal facilities and property management were given until the end of the week to accept or reject the offer to return. They are scheduled to officially resume work on October 6, after nearly seven months of absence during which they continued to receive their salaries.
GSA Workforce Cuts Backfire, Forcing Costly Rehires
A spokesperson for the agency said that the leadership team has reviewed previous decisions and is making adjustments in the interest of other government agencies and American taxpayers. However, experts stressed that the downsizing had disastrous results. Chad Baker, a former official in the real estate division, said the agency had been operating in “life support mode” for months due to staff shortages, disrupting performance and weakening its ability to carry out core functions.
The GSA—founded in the 1940s to oversee federal property and procurement—was left paralyzed by the mass departures. Other agencies targeted by DOGE faced similar situations, including the Internal Revenue Service (IRS), which allowed some resigned employees to remain, the Department of Labor, which rehired some incentivized retirees, and the National Park Service, which reinstated several laid-off staff.
Democrats in Congress seized on the reversal of layoffs as evidence that the original decisions were hasty and costly. Representative Greg Stanton, the ranking Democrat on the subcommittee overseeing the GSA, said: “These measures created costly confusion and weakened the services citizens rely on.”
Employees who received the return offers have until October 6 to decide whether to resume their duties or reject the offer.
