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Largest Mass Resignation in US History as 100k Federal Workers Quit
- frogperson 1y ago[flagged]
- philipallstar 1y agoFascists generally want everything centrally controlled. Not really a small government mindset.
- sjsdaiuasgdia 1y agoHave you noticed ICE's budget lately?
- mc32 1y agoICE doesn’t do law enforcement against citizens. It does affect citizens tangentially but not directly. ICE will not come after citizens for crimes. That would be regular local police, state police or FBI/ATF, etc. ICE is immigration enforcement. Some people may not like that especially illegal residents but it would be a poor way to affect citizens like fascists or communists did.
- thunderfork 1y ago[dead]
- blurbleblurble 1y agoYou haven't been paying attention.
- mc32 1y agoWhat do you mean? If you mean interfering with officers carrying out their duties, then yes, people do get arrested for that. But you would get arrested for interfering with any law enforcement. People do get to protest but they do not get the right to protest violently nor do they get a right to interfere with law enforcement just because they disagree with the law. Just like if you want to protest eminent domain but officers come in to move out protesters getting in the way of construction. People will get arrested. You can protest peacefully. You cannot interfere with official acts or be violent.
- blurbleblurble 1y agoLet me be clear that ICE = DHS in my mind. https://www.npr.org/2025/06/30/nx-s1-5445398/denaturalization-trump-immigration-enforcement https://www.npr.org/2025/06/30/nx-s1-5445398/denaturalizatio... https://www.kenklippenstein.com/p/trumps-nspm-7-labels-common-beliefs https://www.kenklippenstein.com/p/trumps-nspm-7-labels-commo... This hasn't gone through but it's abundantly clear what the goals are: https://www.nationofchange.org/2025/09/15/house-bill-would-let-marco-rubio-strip-passports-over-political-speech/ https://www.nationofchange.org/2025/09/15/house-bill-would-l...
- sjsdaiuasgdia 1y agohttps://www.usatoday.com/story/news/nation/2025/09/30/citizens-seek-damages-after-violent-ice-arrests/86419733007/ https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/nation/2025/09/30/citize... https://www.wbez.org/immigration/2025/09/28/ice-made-unlawful-arrests-during-operation-midway-blitz-new-court-filing-says https://www.wbez.org/immigration/2025/09/28/ice-made-unlawfu... https://goldman.house.gov/media/press-releases/goldman-warren-padilla-kelly-and-correa-demand-investigations-ices-detention https://goldman.house.gov/media/press-releases/goldman-warre... Just a few of the hits for "us citizen ice arrest"
- staplers 1y agoWhat does the national guard do against citizens?
- mc32 1y agoKind of the same role they played during the civil rights struggle. They are there to bolster law enforcement when local law enforcement may be overwhelmed enforcing federal law.
- actionfromafar 1y agoICE will (and already are to an extent) come after anyone who looks like trouble. If they want to superficially follow the law, they beat people up and release them after 23 hours after "discovering" the person is a citizen. Then, repeat as many times as necessary. Since nobody actually knows who ICE is, it can devolve pretty easily from there. The most pedestrian would be protection money to avoid detention, from citizens and non-citizens, it doesn't matter.
- flohofwoe 1y agoThe Nazis and Communists also didn't come after 'citizens' at first: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/First_They_Came https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/First_They_Came
- cogman10 1y agoTrump has actively talked about denaturalizing his enemies [1]. You would be technically correct that he's not going after citizens, but that's only because he'll declare everyone he doesn't like antifa and thus not worthy of citizenship. A move, I should point out, that the Nazis did to the Jews and Communists. [1] https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/politics/2025/01/27/trump-resumes-threat-to-denaturalize-citizens/77905612007/ https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/politics/2025/01/27/trum...
- pfannkuchen 1y agoI find the constant equating of illegal immigrants with Jews who lived legally in Germany for many generations and who had done nothing illegal or wrong at all very disturbing. It minimizes what happened there.
- sjsdaiuasgdia 1y agoAnd that happened where in my comment?
- pfannkuchen 1y agoIf not for Nazi Germany, would the behavior of the current admin, especially with respect to ICE, be labeled “fascist”? My impression is that the optics of vanning people is reminiscent of the optics of what happened in Germany, and so the label comes out. This is bolstered by Nazi Germany being probably the most covered topic in American history class for the past many decades, as well as similar coverage in Hollywood, to the point where “bad guy” and Nazi/fascist are basically synonyms. Are you coming from somewhere else?
- naabb 1y agoYou're saying that ICE only targets illegal immigrants? how do they know who's an illegal immigrant? skin colour? Because that's the criteria they're applying right now. Also what do you say about ICE detaining legal residents? you stated "equating illegal immigrants with Jews [...]" as if ICE is only detaining illegal immigrants. They're not. They're detaining anyone who isn't white enough. Members of the Trump regime have also threatened to deport legal citizens who are just exercicing their free speech. You're anti free speech as well? When is your moral framework going to kick in and call a spade a spade?
- computerthings 1y ago[dead]
- heavyset_go 1y agoI mean, you can be just as callous and say that those who remained in Germany after the country legally revoked their citizenship[1] had, in fact, done something illegal by remaining there. They were just as illegal as a kid who has lived here since she was 3 months old. Yours is also the same argument that was made for years about not including LGBT people among the victims of the Holocaust, since they had in fact broken the law by existing. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nuremberg_Laws#Reich_Citizenship_Law https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nuremberg_Laws#Reich_Citizensh...
- philipallstar 1y agoIf anything, fascism has historically been pretty in favour of being in other countries without their permission.
- lawn 1y agoThey don't demonstrate a small government mindset. The amount of micromanagement is just ridiculous. To gain control they must first purge the people who don't follow their whims.
- actionfromafar 1y agoThey generally don't like public servants to actually serve the public and follow the law. There must first be a purge.
- bryanlarsen 1y agoFascists generally want everything centrally controlled, but the mechanism generally used is government control of industry. The government itself might become relatively small because government functions are performed by industry in government control. Or by the military, not the civilian government.
- AlexandrB 1y agoDon't bother with nuance, in 2025 everything bad[1] is "fascism". The idea that authoritarianism can have any other form seems to be forgotten. [1] Often defined as something a poster doesn't agree with, thought sometimes genuinely bad things as well.
- HanClinto 1y ago> The word Fascism has now no meaning except in so far as it signifies "something not desirable." From "Politics and the English Language" by George Orwell (1946)
- bigfudge 1y agoI don't think Facism is a meaningless concept, or the use of it to describe Trump/MAGA is empty. From https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Definitions_of_fascism https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Definitions_of_fascism --- In his 1995 essay "Ur-Fascism", cultural theorist Umberto Eco lists fourteen general properties of fascist ideology.[17] He argues that it is not possible to organise these into a coherent system, but that "it is enough that one of them be present to allow fascism to coagulate around it". He uses the term "Ur-Fascism" as a generic description of different historical forms of fascism. The fourteen properties are as follows: "The cult of tradition", characterized by cultural syncretism, even at the risk of internal contradiction. When all truth has already been revealed by tradition, no new learning can occur, only further interpretation and refinement. "The rejection of modernism", which views the rationalistic development of Western culture since the Enlightenment as a descent into depravity. Eco distinguishes this from a rejection of superficial technological advancement, as many fascist regimes cite their industrial potency as proof of the vitality of their system. "The cult of action for action's sake", which dictates that action is of value in itself and should be taken without intellectual reflection. This, says Eco, is connected with anti-intellectualism and irrationalism, and often manifests in attacks on modern culture and science. "Disagreement is treason" – fascism devalues intellectual discourse and critical reasoning as barriers to action, as well as out of fear that such analysis will expose the contradictions embodied in a syncretistic faith. "Fear of difference", which fascism seeks to exploit and exacerbate, often in the form of racism or an appeal against foreigners and immigrants. "Appeal to a frustrated middle class", fearing economic pressure from the demands and aspirations of lower social groups. "Obsession with a plot" and the hyping-up of an enemy threat. This often combines an appeal to xenophobia with a fear of disloyalty and sabotage from marginalized groups living within the society (such as the German elite's "fear" of the 1930s Jewish populace's businesses and well-doings; see also antisemitism). Eco also cites Pat Robertson's book The New World Order as a prominent example of a plot obsession. Fascist societies rhetorically cast their enemies as "at the same time too strong and too weak". On the one hand, fascists play up the power of certain disfavored elites to encourage in their followers a sense of grievance and humiliation. On the other hand, fascist leaders point to the decadence of those elites as proof of their ultimate feebleness in the face of an overwhelming popular will. "Pacifism is trafficking with the enemy" because "life is permanent warfare" – there must always be an enemy to fight. Both fascist Germany under Hitler and Italy under Mussolini worked first to organize and clean up their respective countries and then build the war machines that they later intended to and did use, despite Germany being under restrictions of the Versailles treaty to not build a military force. This principle leads to a fundamental contradiction within fascism: the incompatibility of ultimate triumph with perpetual war. "Contempt for the weak", which is uncomfortably married to a chauvinistic popular elitism, in which every member of society is superior to outsiders by virtue of belonging to the in-group. Eco sees in these attitudes the root of a deep tension in the fundamentally hierarchical structure of fascist polities, as they encourage leaders to despise their underlings, up to the ultimate leader, who holds the whole country in contempt for having allowed him to overtake it by force. "Everybody is educated to become a hero", which leads to the embrace of a cult of death. As Eco observes, "[t]he Ur-Fascist hero is impatient to die. In his impatience, he more frequently sends other people to death." "Machismo", which sublimates the difficult work of permanent war and heroism into the sexual sphere. Fascists thus hold "both disdain for women and intolerance and condemnation of nonstandard sexual habits, from chastity to homosexuality". "Selective populism" – the people, conceived monolithically, have a common will, distinct from and superior to the viewpoint of any individual. As no mass of people can ever be truly unanimous, the leader holds himself out as the interpreter of the popular will (though truly he alone dictates it). Fascists use this concept to delegitimize democratic institutions they accuse of "no longer represent[ing] the voice of the people". "Newspeak" – fascism employs and promotes an impoverished vocabulary to limit critical reasoning. From a European perspective, it's really hard not to see much/all of this resonating in MAGA USA.
- notfromhere 1y agoIn the U.S. context this impacts agencies that regulate industry and offer beneficial state services (healthcare, food inspection, pollution monitoring) and not services that impact state control (DHS, the military, or domestic secret police (FBI)). The longstanding goal has been to undo the new deal
- yndoendo 1y agoI recommend _Culture in Nazi Germany_ by Michael H. Kater. [1] Propaganda was the control they wanted. 3rd party companies and organizations allowed for a pseud disconnect with the shared propaganda. See this paper, music group, artist supports our ideology and we are not paying them for it. Centrally controlled does not mean being centrally employed. Just take a look at all the big businesses that assisted fascism for financial gain. Lot of it being slave labor. [0] [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_companies_involved_in_the_Holocaust https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_companies_involved_in_.... [1] https://yalebooks.yale.edu/book/9780300253375/culture-in-nazi-germany/ https://yalebooks.yale.edu/book/9780300253375/culture-in-naz... * Added link to the book.
- philipallstar 1y agoI honestly don't understand this. Businesses have been doing loads of things along with the last government as well - silencing/reducing certain views while promoting others, and creating a monoculture throughout schools, universities, and businesses. Why do you only see it when this side does it (or some fraction of it)?
- sjsdaiuasgdia 1y ago[flagged]
- onlyrealcuzzo 1y agoAnd the majority of voters, which seems like the more important part. If we had a wanna-be dictator president, and the vast majority of people despised that, there's a pretty clear path to recovery. Here, it is not so clear.
- sjsdaiuasgdia 1y agoDepends on how you measure things. Trump did not receive a majority of all possible votes, nor did he receive a majority of all votes that were cast. He did receive a plurality of votes that were cast. 2024 voting-eligible population: 244.6M Voted for Trump: 77.3M Voted for Harris: 75M Voted for other candidates: 2.6M Eligible to vote, but didn't vote: 90M
- hollerith 1y agoAnd if more people had turned out to vote, Trump would have won by an even bigger margin, according to the polls.
- a_ba 1y agoBut then again the oldest trick in the authoritarian‘s playbook is to abandon the path of democracy by tilting the scales in their party’s favor. which is why you want strong independent institutions and separation of powers in a democracy, something the current administration does not appear to be in favor of.
- pm90 1y agoIt’s a terrifying experiment in hollowing out the civil service. At some point a critical mass of Federal workers may be lost which brings the entire machinery of the Federal Government to a standstill. It’s also not clear how to recover from something like this.
- exabrial 1y ago[flagged]
- krainboltgreene 1y agoThis is the same thought process behind layoffs and is categorically, scientifically, absurd. It doesn't pan out that you "only let go of the people you don't want" and it turns out those people you let go signal to the people you absolutely want that they should leave.
- oldandboring 1y agoI don't support what the Trump administration is doing. But saying it's "categorically, scientifically, absurd" to lay people off is some next-level stuff. I can guarantee to anyone reading this, that this person has never owned a business with any kind of significant overhead.
- rockercoaster 1y ago[dead]
- krainboltgreene 1y agoCome on, it's 2025, you really think no one has studied the effects of layoffs on a company? https://hbr.org/2018/05/layoffs-that-dont-break-your-company https://hbr.org/2018/05/layoffs-that-dont-break-your-company > For instance, a study of one Fortune 500 tech firm done by Teresa Amabile at Harvard Business School discovered that after the firm cut its staff by 15%, the number of new inventions it produced fell 24%. In addition, layoffs can rupture ties between salespeople and customers. Researchers Paul Williams, M. Sajid Khan, and Earl Naumann have found that customers are more likely to defect after a company conducts layoffs. Then there’s the effect on a company’s reputation: E. Geoffrey Love and Matthew S. Kraatz of University of Illinois at Urbana–Champaign found that companies that did layoffs saw a decline in their ranking on Fortune’s list of most admired companies. > A 2002 study by Magnus Sverke and Johnny Hellgren of Stockholm University and Katharina Näswall of University of Canterbury found that after a layoff, survivors experienced a 41% decline in job satisfaction, a 36% decline in organizational commitment, and a 20% decline in job performance. > In a 2012 review of 20 studies of companies that had gone through layoffs, Deepak Datta at the University of Texas at Arlington found that layoffs had a neutral to negative effect on stock prices in the days following their announcement. Datta also discovered that after layoffs a majority of companies suffered declines in profitability, and a related study showed that the drop in profits persisted for three years. And a team of researchers from Auburn University, Baylor University, and the University of Tennessee found that companies that have layoffs are twice as likely to file for bankruptcy as companies that don’t have them. It also just doesn't make any sense whatsoever. Also, there's no reason to cast aspersions. Feel free to actually engage anytime you want.
- darknavi 1y agoResignation? Doesn't that imply that they are choosing to leave? > The resignations—which come as part of a program drawn up by President Donald Trump at the start of his second administration—will happen on Tuesday as Congress is facing a deadline on the same day to authorize more funding or risk a government shutdown. > If there is no deal, the White House has ordered federal agencies to make plans for the large-scale redundancies.
- deleted 1y ago[deleted]
- 0xffff2 1y agoI believe the 100k are those that took the "deferred resignation program" at the beginning of the year. They have been getting paid to not bother showing up to work all this time, but are finally coming up on the date where they will all officially resign. Those people are choosing to leave.
- AnimalMuppet 1y agoTook? Or got placed on? Genuine question, because I don't know the answer. Was it actually voluntary at the time?
- 0xffff2 1y agoIt was actually and completely voluntary. My only source is that I am a federal contractor who was invited to at least some of the all hands meetings where this was discussed within my agency. The federal government is _huge_ and obviously I can't speak to every single agency, but at least for mine there wasn't even a hint of pressure to take the offer.
- burkaman 1y agoIt was voluntary on paper, but there was a clear threat that if you didn't take it there was a good chance you would be fired with no severance. Whether this threat was implicit or explicit depended on what department you were in. Source: Federal workers I know personally, and numerous public statements from DOGE officials and cabinet secretaries when this offer was made. > “The reality is clear: A large-scale reduction, in response to the President’s workforce executive orders, is already happening. The government is restructuring, and unfortunately, many employees will later realize they missed a valuable, once-in-a-lifetime opportunity,” the official said. - https://www.cnn.com/2025/02/04/politics/trump-administration-plans-layoffs-deferred-resignation-offer https://www.cnn.com/2025/02/04/politics/trump-administration...
- Simulacra 1y agoSalient point: this is not a resignation, these are the people who took the buyout, and the buyout period is ending. There's not going to be this mass resignation today of people walking out of their jobs. They've already left the position.
- diddid 1y ago[flagged]
- gigatexal 1y agoNo. the administrative state is negligible budget expense in the grand scheme of government payments. Interest payments, entitlements, defense budgets etc are orders of magnitude more. Trump is just using the Project 2025 playbook to screw over the American people and the USA and line his pockets while he can. The idiots over at the heritage foundation are foaming at the mouth they're so happy now.
- cjs_ac 1y agoIn the Westminster system, if Parliament can't pass the budget brought by the Government[0], the head of state dissolves Parliament and issues writs for a new general election. This is because raising taxes and spending money is most of what the Government does, so an inability to do this is a constitutional crisis. In the US, this is impossible, because the head of state leads the administration that prepares the budget. Historical example: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1975_Australian_constitutional_crisis https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1975_Australian_constitutional... [0] what would be called the Administration in the US
- koolba 1y agoIn most such systems it’s a simple majority vote of a unicameral legislator. The uniqueness of the USA is the bicameral legislature with de facto veto by the minority by refusing cloture. Without at 8-10 members of the minority breaking ranks (depending on the actual split), a unified minority can cause complete gridlock.
- rsynnott 1y agoNearly all democratic countries have bicameral legislatures, though some do exclude the upper house from money bills.
- emorning4 1y ago[dead]
- ldoughty 1y agoThese people mostly already and effectively stopped working... The people I know that took this offer were told to stop showing up for work back in March-ish time frame. I see nothing in the article to suggest a sudden wave of new people taking up this offer -- as far as I can tell, the only thing that's about to change from what this article says is that our unemployment numbers will start to reflect it if those federal workers did not find new employment.
- deleted 1y ago[deleted]
- Jtsummers 1y ago> These people mostly already and effectively stopped working... The people I know that took this offer were told to stop showing up for work back in March-ish time frame. Well, yes. That's what the DRP was, they were put on administrative leave through 30 September. It's kind of hard to work when you're on admin leave. Are you surprised by the fact that this group of DRP folks are resigning on 30 Sept when that was the agreement they signed under the DRP? Did you expect something else?
- paulsutter 1y agoAll of these resignations were submitted before February 12. The resigning employees have been collecting payroll until today, but they resigned long ago Flagged as misleading/inflammatory. Most of the comments here are probably bots.
- thinkcontext 1y agoThe deferred retirement scheme is an incredibly ill-conceived way of shrinking the government. The way the incentive is structured it encourages the workers who are most able to find another job to leave. These are your best workers. The ones that will disproportionately stay are the least competitive in the job market. The other group of workers that will take it are those that were going to leave or retire anyway. So, for them its a waste of money and the transfer of their knowledge is cut short. The same goes for the other DOGE employment initiative of firing probationary employees. These are mostly either people you have just hired or those that have been promoted. Of course, these are the employees you would most want to keep.
- atmavatar 1y agoThat's the point, though. Since Reagan, the Republican party's stance has always been that government can't do anything right, so we should get rid of as much of it as possible, and every time Republicans have had the power to do so, they've sabotaged various agencies, then pointed to the inevitable problems that arise as proof of their claim. An example of this was decommissioning mail sorting machines during Trump's first term, resulting in mail delays. If you get rid of the most competent government workers, then obviously, government services will function less effectively, which will serve to bolster claims that those services simply don't work and should be shuttered anyway.
- unit149 1y ago[dead]
- bix6 1y agoCan someone explain the DRP to me? I don’t understand why people got paid to take 8 months of leave if they resigned?
- actionfromafar 1y agoIt's a quick and easy way to kneecap an organization. Who cares what it costs, it's only taxpayer money.
- ndiddy 1y agoAt the start of the year, the OPM announced that federal workers could either take a voluntary resignation and go on paid leave until Sept. 30 (today), or be subject to return-to-office orders (including forced relocation if necessary), higher performance standards, and further involuntary layoffs. According to this article, about 100,000 people took the voluntary resignation. As for motive, it's a way for the Trump admin to clear out the federal workforce and install loyalists to make it easier for him to carry out his agenda.
- bix6 1y agoThank you!
- txru 1y agoThere are two elements of this situation that I'm consistently trying to open-mindedly hold in balance. One part is what I call "The Great Defederalization". In a myriad of ways, the federal state that was erected between FDR and LBJ is being torn down. That state existed on a group of decisions that allowed independent agencies outside of the direct oversight of the president: the Humphrey's Executor agencies, NLRB, FCC, FTC. The Supreme Court and Congress are very happy to work on rolling them back, and they were constructed on pretty awful jurisprudence to begin with. That can work-- we should engage in creative destruction, the administrative state did restrict economic growth, and it did create carve-outs out of the Constitution. If it made us a more reliable partner, that did come at the cost of flexibility. But at the same time, this executive isn't defederalizing to defer power to the states-- it's doing it to grant more immediate power to the president, who is in effect weaponizing the armed forces and police forces against non-compliant localities and personal enemies. News like this happening the same week as the president sends the Army to a passive American city in order to plainly provoke a conflict, and directing his DoJ to enact a case on paper thin justification, is troubling, to say the least.
- rayiner 1y agoThe first point requires an additional layer. The modern administrative state has its origins in Woodrow Wilson ideology of scientific governance. Wilson didn’t like democracy and wasn’t much of a fan of the constitution: https://teachingamericanhistory.org/document/the-study-of-administration-2 https://teachingamericanhistory.org/document/the-study-of-ad.... A consequence of centralizing governance in a giant federal bureaucracy is that it’s become dominated by one party: https://www.govexec.com/pay-benefits/2016/10/federal-employees-are-donating-almost-exclusively-hillary-clinton/132667/ https://www.govexec.com/pay-benefits/2016/10/federal-employe.... That was a predictable result of federalization. If the government is run by unelected bureaucrats insulated from the elected officials, then it’s completely unsurprising it will become dominated by the party that prefers bigger government. In classic Trump fashion, he doesn’t care about federalism per se, hence his inconsistent actions on law enforcement and crime. But he has a brain stem level reaction that it’s crazy he got elected President and is expected to cajole a federal workforce of 1.8 million democrats into executing his policies. And he’s not wrong about that. Regarding the DOJ, Thomas Jefferson personally directed the prosecution of Aaron Burr: https://constitutioncenter.org/blog/the-great-trial-that-tested-the-constitutions-treason-clause https://constitutioncenter.org/blog/the-great-trial-that-tes.... So that part isn’t anything new. As to the merits of the case, 18 USC 1001 is astonishingly (and I’d argue unconstitutionally) broad. I think prosecuting people for “obstruction” without an underlying crime is bullshit, but the government does it all the time. And Comey vociferously defended the practice.
- johnohara 1y agoThe real shame in all of this is the fact that buried deep within the 100k are workers who actually know a thing or two about how things actually work, have the experience and knowledge to get things done, have a pretty good idea how to improve the processes and policies, have chosen to do their assigned duties correctly, but have probably had limited success trying to change things. So they're getting out because "it's time I guess. Not much else I can do."
- keanb 1y ago[flagged]
- rsynnott 1y ago> Speaking to Newsweek, Scott Lucas, who teaches international politics at University College Dublin It perhaps says a lot about the current situation in academia in the US that they had to go _outside the US_ (albeit to an American working outside the US) for comment.
- stefap2 1y agoWhat i have seen is that those who resigned had 20+ years experience and younger folks stayed. So it was a bit of a brain drain, at least from my limited interaction with the three letter agencies.