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 due date to submit plans for large-scale layoffs

Workers would receive buyout payment of up to $25,000

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Buyout program less susceptible to legal challenge

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

March 11 (Reuters) – Multiple government companies are turning to early retirement programs to lower headcount as they scramble to meet President Donald Trump’s Thursday deadline for them to send strategies for a second round of mass layoffs.

The Office of Personnel Management, the Social Security Administration, and the Department of Health and Human Services, including its Fda, are amongst the companies which have offered lump-sum payments of up to $25,000 before tax to workers who agree to leave their tasks.

The buyout offers, combined with another program that relieves eligibility requirements for early retirement, are being embraced as a lower-friction way to assist meet the Thursday deadline, personnel experts at numerous federal firms informed Reuters.

The Trump administration has actually been facing myriad lawsuits after it fired thousands of probationary workers in a very first wave of mass layoffs and took apart whole departments like USAID, the U.S. humanitarian help agency, and the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, which protects Americans against dishonest loan providers.

All U.S. government firms have actually been purchased to come up with large-scale layoff plans by Thursday as part of Trump’s unprecedented campaign to overhaul the government. Among 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 manages the federal government’s residential or commercial property portfolio, is also looking for approval to offer the buyout payments to employees, according to an email sent out by its acting head to staff on Monday and seen by Reuters. The Securities and Exchange Commission has currently offered perks of as much as $50,000, Reuters reported.

Personnel and public governance professionals stated the appeal of the buyout program, called voluntary separation reward payments, is that it is voluntary and less susceptible to legal challenges. It likewise requires employees who have actually accepted the offer to pay back the money if they take another government job within 5 years.

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

OPM STILL WAITING FOR PLANS

Only a couple of agencies have actually telegraphed through media leaks the number of workers they plan to cut in the second stage of layoffs. They include the Department of Veterans Affairs, which is aiming to cut more than 80,000 employees, and the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, which is preparing to cut 1,029 staff.

Despite the looming deadline, no company has yet submitted its job-cutting strategy to OPM, the federal government’s human resources department that is looking at the data, a person familiar with the matter informed Reuters. OPM declined to comment.

OPM itself has used lump-sum payments to some 650 OPM staff members, according to another person with understanding of the matter. Employees were given till March 12 to react.

At the General Services Administration, employees were notified on Monday that OPM had greenlit a strategy to provide an early retirement program to all qualified employees.

“I motivate each of you to consider your options as we progress,” GSA Acting Administrator Stephen Ehikian wrote in an email seen by Reuters. “The brand-new GSA will be slimmer, more effective and laser-focused on effectiveness and high-value results.”

On March 10, the HR department of the Food and Drug Administration sent an email to all its 19,000 employees revealing a Friday, March 14, due date to opt into a VSIP. Those who accept would have to retire by April 19.

“There will be no extensions,” mentions the e-mail, 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 offer by adding that workers accepting it would get 2 months of complete pay in addition to the perk, according to a copy of the email seen by Reuters.

Steve Lenkart, executive director of the of Federal Employees, a union which represents 110,000 federal government workers, said the Trump administration was using “a genuine program to more damage the capabilities of companies to complete their mission.”

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