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Elon Musk's latest actions as the head of the Department of Government Efficiency have been controversially received, as the billionaire has supposedly put over 100,000 federal jobs at risk if they don't respond adequately to an email.
US President Donald Trump's creation the Department of Government Efficiency, otherwise known as 'DOGE', quickly indicated that the removal of alleged 'waste' from government spending has been a priority for his administration.
Close ally and keen supporter Elon Musk was installed as the head of the department, swiftly promising up to $2,000,000,000,000 in cuts across the board, and it's clear that Musk and his small team in the White House have been ruthless so far.
The Associated Press has estimated that hundreds of thousands of federal workers have already been affected by DOGE-related cuts, with departments such as Veterans Affairs, Defense, Health, and Human Services feeling the brunt of Musk's efforts.
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Consistent with President @realDonaldTrump’s instructions, all federal employees will shortly receive an email requesting to understand what they got done last week.
— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) February 22, 2025
Failure to respond will be taken as a resignation.
The government has also been on the receiving end of major criticism following cuts to National Parks, as recent protests at Yosemite have seen recently-laid off staff display an upside-down American flag.
Having brandished a 'chainsaw for bureaucracy' on stage at the Conservative Political Action Conference just a few days ago, Musk has now threatened continued widespread job losses through an ominous email, as reported by AP.
"Consistent with President @realDonaldTrump's instructions," Musk posted on X on February 22, "all federal employees will shortly receive an email requesting to understand what they got done last week. Failure to respond will be taken as a resignation."
Not only is there the threat of firing through non-compliance, but many point out that requesting employees to list their tasks in the last week implies that they'll be judged on this specifically, and be at further risk of losing their job.
Musk then followed this up with a poll the day after, asking his followers: "Should all federal employees be required to send a short email with some basic bullet points about what they accomplished last week?" Upon completion, 70.6% of respondents chose the 'Yes' option.
Emails have indeed been sent out, with a listed deadline of Monday at 11:59 pm to respond, although there was no mention within the email that failing to respond would result in them losing their job.
Contrastingly, key departments and agencies have indicated to their employees that they don't need to respond to these emails, with acting undersecretary for management Tibor Nagy asserting: "The State Department will respond on behalf of the Department. No employee is obligated to report their activities outside of their Department chain of command."
This is somewhat similar to circumstances shortly after Musk took over Twitter, as he also sent out an email to all employees that would result in their firing if they failed to respond.
Musk was left in legal trouble because of this though, as one former employee won a $600,000 lawsuit after he was fired following a failure to reply to the email in question, so it has surprised some that the richest man in the world has reemployed this tactic, especially within a federal setting.
Others have pointed out loop holes within this directive, questioning what happens if an employee has been on vacation in the last week, or is currently on vacation as the email came in.
Additionally, while DOGE employees are reportedly working 120 weeks including the weekends, most federal employees work a Monday to Friday schedule, meaning that the supposed '48 hour' deadline is in fact under 24 hours in actuality.
