Labor

'Like a knife in the back': 'Warning sign' for Dems as Teamsters ramp up donations to GOP

Politico reports Teamsters General President Sean O'Brien is hedging his bets and supporting Republicans after years of buttressing Democrats.

“Our members are working people whose interests cut across party lines,” said Teamsters spokesperson Kara Deniz. “And there’s no value in living in a bubble … where you only talk to certain people to the exclusion of others.”

After nearly two decades of mostly backing Democrats, Politico reports the GOP donations “signify a marked shift in the pivotal labor union’s strategy since 2024,” when Teamsters General President Sean O’Brien delivered a historic address at the Republican National Convention in Milwaukee and his union began more seriously supporting Republicans.

This will mark the second year in a row the labor union’s political arm donated to the Republicans’ House campaign arm, says Politico, which reports the union’s D.R.I.V.E (Democrat, Republican, Independent Voter Education) political action committee gave the National Republican Congressional Committee $5,000 in the second quarter. In addition to giving to the NRCC, Teamsters gave a combined $62,000 to nearly two-dozen GOP congressional candidates, including those running in significant battleground districts.

The 23 Republicans Politico reports the union supported all went on to win their respective seats, suggesting the union donates to winners. This included Rep. Rob Bresnahan (R-Pa.) and Rep. Mike Lawler, (R-New York), among others.

Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee Spokesperson Viet Shelton questioned union leaders’ loyalty to members.

“Congressional Republicans have betrayed America’s workers and union members by selling out our communities for the GOP’s billionaire backers,” said Shelton.

Twitter critics also complained of betrayal, pointing out that it was the Biden Admin that saved the pension fund Teamsters rely on “so their president showed his appreciation by supporting Republicans.”

“Not one damn Republican voted to save the hard-earned pensions of the Teamsters,” said At Our Table Show Host Jaime Harrison on Twitter. “Not one!”

“I helped canvas to defeat Right To Work, which [Sen.] Josh [Hawley (R-Mo.)] supported as AG and during his initial Senate campaign,” posted another commenter. “Now, with abortion on the line … the Teamsters are donating to him? Not gonna lie. This feels like a knife in the back.”

The group hasn’t forsaken Democrats, who still benefit from “far more contributions than Republicans,” reports Politico, but the shift does count as “a warning sign” for Democrats who continue to lose union support.

Read the full Politico report at this link

From Your Site Articles

Related Articles Around the Web

'Patently unlawful': FBI ripped for backing Cornyn’s bid to hunt down Texas Dems

The Federal Bureau of Investigation has agreed to a request from U.S. Senator John Cornyn to locate the Texas Democratic state lawmakers who exited the state in an effort to deny Republicans a quorum—part of a broader attempt to block Governor Greg Abbott and President Donald Trump’s push to redraw congressional maps and boost GOP-held House seats, the Texas Republican announced Thursday.

“We cannot allow these rogue legislators to avoid their constitutional responsibilities,” Senator Cornyn said in a statement that referred to the Texas Democrats as “supposed lawmakers.”

Axios reported that “Texas issued civil warrants for the Democratic lawmakers, but local law enforcement can’t make arrests outside the state.”

The Texas Democrats are in Illinois, according to that state’s Democratic governor, JB Pritzker.

Legal and political experts are blasting the move.

“There’s literally no federal law applicable to this situation. None,” Governor Pritzker told podcaster Jessica Yellin on Wednesday, according to Axios.

“The key question here is on what grounds would the FBI be doing this,” wrote MSNBC Justice and Intelligence correspondent Ken Dilanian. “What is the crime they are investigating? The FBI can’t just use its vast surveillance powers to locate random citizens. In fact, that’s what conservatives have long been so concerned about re FISA authorities.”

“This is a patently unlawful, unconstitutional abuse of federal power,” constitutional law professor and political scientist Anthony Michael Kreis said on Thursday.

“We are in a deeply dangerous, illiberal place in America when the federal government will deploy law enforcement to force state legislators to act on legislation that’s contrary to their conscience and an attempt to undermine free elections,” Kreis added.

The Atlantic’s Dr. Norman Ornstein, a political scientist, addressed Senator Cornyn: “John, I understand your need to tilt crazy right to counter your lunatic primary challenger. But calling on the FBI to act illegally and wrongly to go after Texas Democrats is beneath you, and simply shameful. You used to believe in the law and the Constitution.”

Asking what “criminal interest” the FBI could have in this, U.S. Rep. Daniel Goldman (D-NY) called it “yet another disgusting partisan abuse of power by the FBI,” and said that “any agent asked to assist should refuse to do so.”

Watch video of Governor Pritzker below or at this link.

— (@)

From Your Site Articles

Related Articles Around the Web

Conservative National Review editorial blasts Trump’s flip flops on key labor issue

President Donald Trump's mass deportations are drawing criticism not only from Democrats and immigrants' rights groups, but also, from some sectors of the business world — including agriculture and hospitality, both of which rely heavily on immigrant labor.

The complaints from businesses are getting Trump's attention, as many farmers voted for him in 2024 and large hotels have been a big part of his real estate empire over the years.

In late June, the Trump White House announced a "temporary pass" for migrants working in agriculture and hospitality. And Trump said, "I cherish our farmers. And when we go into a farm and we take away people that have been working there for 15 and 20 years, who were good, who possibly came in incorrectly. And what we're going to do is we're going to do something for farmers where we can let the farmer sort of be in charge. The farmer knows he's not going to hire a murderer."

But the conservative National Review, in an editorial published on July 1, comments, "Funny, we don't remember when it was that the American people elected the farm and hotel lobbies to be in charge of immigration enforcement."

The United States, the Review argues, needs a "robust" system to help businesses make sure that people they hire are in the country legally.

"America is more than a day-laborer hiring platform," The National Review's editorial board argues. "The hospitality and agriculture industries should not get a pass. And they should adapt themselves to lawful hiring. There is already a generous visa system for such workers; it can always be simplified and made easier to use. Hiring within the law almost certainly will mean offering higher wages or better working conditions and exploring greater automation, expedients that other American industries take for granted."

The Review editors add, "The alternative is a status quo in which a slice of the economy is marked off as the preserve of illegal labor. This constitutes allowing employers to create a class of workers who don't have the full protection of the law. This goes against America's republican ideals and the Republican Party’s founding principle of free men and free labor competing under one set of laws for all."

Read The National Review's full editorial at this link.

From Your Site Articles

Related Articles Around the Web

Ron DeSantis blasted as he suggests replacing migrant workers with children

Florida has a very complex relationship with immigration.

On one hand, the Sunshine State is well-known for its abundance of immigrants from Latin America and the Caribbean. When Gov. Ron DeSantis was reelected by 19 percent in 2022, he received a great deal of Latino support. Florida Republicans have a long history of courting conservative Cuban-American voters, and Donald Trump's 2024 campaign ran plenty of Spanish-language ads in South Florida.

On the other hand, DeSantis is a supporter of President Trump's mass deportations — many of which are occurring in Florida.

Defenders of immigrants' rights are pointing out that the deportations are causing a lot of Florida businesses to lose hard-working employees. DeSantis, according to The Guardian's Richard Luscombe, is offering a solution: making it easier to hire more minors. But Luscombe stresses that the Florida governor's proposal is raising child labor concerns.

At a recent immigration forum in Sarasota, Florida with Trump's "immigration czar," Tom Homan, the 46-year-old DeSantis discussed a GOP-sponsored Florida State Senate bill on employment and told attendees, "What’s wrong with expecting our young people to be working part-time now? That's how it used to be when I was growing up…. Why do we say we need to import foreigners, even import them illegally, when teenagers used to work at these resorts? College students should be (doing) all this stuff."

But Alexis Tsoukalas, senior policy analyst at the Florida Policy Institute (FPI), is worried about teenage workers possibly being exploited.

Luscombe quotes Tsoukalas as saying, "It's essentially treating teens who have developing bodies and minds like adults, and this will allow employers to schedule them for unlimited hours, overnight and without breaks, and this is during the school year. It's important to remind people that teens can work. They can get that experience and some extra money if they need it. But there have to be protections in place to protect our most vulnerable, and if we pass this, that’s absolutely not going to happen."

Read The Guardian's full article at this link.

From Your Site Articles

Related Articles Around the Web

'Fall in line or else': Newest Trump order seen as message

President Donald Trump's latest attack on the working class was delivered in the form of an executive order late Thursday that seeks to strip the collective bargaining rights from hundreds of thousands of federal government workers, a move that labor rights advocates said is not only unlawful but once again exposes Trump's deep antagonism toward working people and their families.

The executive order by Trump says its purpose is to "enhance the national security of the United States," but critics say it's clear the president is hiding behind such a claim as a way to justify a broadside against collective bargaining by the public workforce and to intimidate workers more broadly.

"President Trump's latest executive order is a disgraceful and retaliatory attack on the rights of hundreds of thousands of patriotic American civil servants—nearly one-third of whom are veterans—simply because they are members of a union that stands up to his harmful policies," said Everett Kelley, president of the 820,000-member American Federation of Government Employees (AFGE), the nation's largest union of federal workers.

"The labor movement is not about to let Trump and an un-elected billionaire destroy what we’ve fought for generations to build. We will fight this outrageous attack on our members with every fiber of our collective being." —Liz Shuler, AFL-CIO

The far-reaching order, which cites the 1978 Civil Service Reform Act as the source of his presidential authority, goes way beyond restricting collective bargaining and union representation at agencies with a national security mandate but instead tries to ensnare dozens of federal agencies and classifications of federal workers who work beyond that scope.

According to the Associated Press, the intent of the order "appears to touch most of the federal government."

AFL-CIO president, Liz Shuler, responded with disgust to the order, pointing out that the move comes directly out of the pre-election blueprint of the Heritage Foundation, which has been planning this kind of attack against the federal workforce and collective bargaining for years, if not decades.

"Straight out of Project 2025, this executive order is the very definition of union-busting," said Schuler in a Thursday night statement. "It strips the fundamental right to unionize and collectively bargain from workers across the federal government at more than 30 agencies. The workers who make sure our food is safe to eat, care for our veterans, protect us from public health emergencies and much more will no longer have a voice on the job or the ability to organize with their coworkers for better conditions at work so they can efficiently provide the services the public relies upon."

Shuler said the order is clearly designed as "punishment for unions who are leading the fight against the administration's illegal actions in court—and a blatant attempt to silence us."

The White House practically admitted as much, saying in a statement that "Trump supports constructive partnerships with unions who work with him; he will not tolerate mass obstruction that jeopardizes his ability to manage agencies with vital national security missions." In effect, especially with a definition of "national security" that encompasses a vast majority of all government functions and agencies, the president has told an estimated two-thirds of government workers they are no longer allowed to disagree with or obstruct his efforts as they organize to defend their jobs or advocate for better working conditions.

Describing the move as "bullying tactics" by Trump and his administration, Kelley said the order represents "a clear threat not just to federal employees and their unions, but to every American who values democracy and the freedoms of speech and association. Trump’s threat to unions and working people across America is clear: fall in line or else."

"These threats will not work. Americans will not be intimidated or silenced. AFGE isn't going anywhere. Our members have bravely served this nation, often putting themselves in harm’s way, and they deserve far better than this blatant attempt at political punishment," he added.

Both AFGE and the AFL-CIO said they would fight the order tooth and nail on behalf of federal workers—and all workers—who have a right to collective bargaining and not to be intimidated for organizing their workplaces, whether in the public or private sector.

"To every single American who cares about the fundamental freedom of all workers, now is the time to be even louder," said Shuler. "The labor movement is not about to let Trump and an un-elected billionaire destroy what we've fought for generations to build. We will fight this outrageous attack on our members with every fiber of our collective being."

Kelley said AFGE was "preparing immediate legal action" in response to Trump's order and vowed to "fight relentlessly to protect our rights, our members, and all working Americans from these unprecedented attacks."

From Your Site Articles

'Make the VA fail': DOGE puts PTSD research and veterans’ cancer care on the chopping block

The Department of Government Efficiency cancelled and then reinstated almost 300 contracts at the Department of Veterans Affairs earlier this week. But there are more contracts that are on the chopping block, including ones that are “central to patient safety,” NBC News reported Thursday.

“What had been a list of 875 VA contracts scheduled for termination a little over a week ago has now become 585 canceled contracts, the VA said Monday," Gretchen Morgenson and Laura Strickler report. "The about-face is a rare public retreat by the so-called efficiency operation known as DOGE, which has come under fire for moving to ax crucial government services and overstating the value of some of its savings to taxpayers.”

On Wednesday, the VA announced that they would be laying off 80,000 workers, after dismissing 2,400 last month.

The VA said the remaining cuts “will not negatively affect Veteran care, benefits or services” and “were identified through a deliberative, multi-level review.”

But these moves could lead to the privatization of healthcare for veterans. “They’re trying to push veterans into community care,” one VA official said, meaning services provided outside of the VA. “And to do that, they’re doing everything they can to make the VA mission fail.”

“The revised list of killed contracts,” Morgenson and Strickler write, “includes those covering sterility certification for VA hospital pharmacy operations, facility air quality and safety testing to prevent transmission of infections, and sterile processing services to decontaminate equipment and medical instruments. Also on the list: contracts providing required certification and accreditation for stroke centers and follow-up care for cancer patients.”

Another cancelled contract pertains to monitoring the safety of radiation equipment used for cancer treatment. “The documents reviewed by NBC News show the termination of multiple contracts for radiation safety officers,” Morgenson and Strickler write.

If this equipment is in violation, hospitals would likely have to shut down, according to a VA official. “You cannot have a hospital that does not have a radiology department,” the official told NBC News.

“Another contract that remains scheduled for cancellation,” Morgenson and Strickler write, “supports the National Center for PTSD, a VA entity that is the world’s leading research and educational center on post-traumatic stress disorder.” This has apparently been deemed "non-mission critical."

Sen. Richard Blumenthal, (D-Conn.) who is the ranking member on the Veteran Affairs Committee, said Veterans Affairs Secretary Doug Collins was being “reckless” to cancel contracts.

“Make no mistake, cancelling these contracts will cause harm to veterans and VA care and benefits,” Blumenthal said in a statement. “And it is completely unacceptable there has been no transparency, accountability, or consultation surrounding these contracts. By intentionally concealing from Congress the full list of contracts cancelled, Collins makes clear his intentions to use these terminated services as numbers for his press release, with zero regard for veterans.”

From Your Site Articles

Related Articles Around the Web

'Concerned' Republican rep. still supports Trump as federal layoffs hit his district

Republican Rep. McKay Erickson, who serves in the Wyoming House of Representatives, knows that federal layoffs are hurting his community, but he is still loyal to President Donald Trump, the Guardian reported Tuesday.

His district includes national lands where workers have been fired as part of the Department of Government Efficiency’s effort to shrink the federal government. Bridger-Teton National Forest and Grand Teton National Park employ — or employed — his constituents.

“These people have a face to me,” Erickson told the Guardian. “They have a face and a place in either Star Valley or Jackson that I know quite well.”

Erickson believes that there needs to be cuts to the federal government, “but in his district, he foresees a lack of trail maintenance hurting local outfitting companies and understaffed parks with closed gates,” writes the Guardian’s Cy Neff.

“This way is so indiscriminate, and it doesn’t really drill down on the real issue as to where those cuts need to be,” Erickson said. “I’m afraid that probably all we’re going to lose is services.”

Still, Erickson maintains his support of the president. “It hasn’t really shaken me. It’s concerned me, but not shaken me in my support,” he said.

Wyoming Senator Cynthia Lummis shared Erickson’s sentiments. “I fully support President Trump’s effort to ferret out the reckless and wasteful spending that has infected our government,” she told KHOL/Jackson Hole Community Radio.

For the past three presidential elections, Wyoming voted for Trump by a wider margin than any other state.

Out of 17 supervisors at Grand Teton National Park, 16 were fired, according to the Associated Press. That leaves one person to oversee dozens of seasonal workers. “They’re basically knee-capping the very people who need to train seasonal” employees, Kristen Brengel, senior vice president of government affairs at the National Parks Conservation Association, told the AP. “It puts the park in an untenable position. You’re going to hurt tourism.″

About 40 out of 220 workers were fired at Bridger-Teton National Forest, which is close to the size of Connecticut, according to Jackson Hole News & Guide.

The head of the U.S. Forest Service, Randy Moore, resigned following layoffs at the agency.

“Our agency’s work supports the nation’s wellbeing and its economy by providing community protection, jobs, goods and services, and a place to retreat and enjoy nature’s beauty,” he wrote in a letter to employees. “Many small businesses generate their livelihoods through permits to operate on national forests and grasslands. We provide drinking water to over 80 million Americans. We also help provide energy independence to the nation, issuing nearly 3,000 oil and gas leases. I say that to say this: You and the work you do are vital to the American way of life, and you are a valued employee who has performed admirably.”

From Your Site Articles

Related Articles Around the Web

'A real shame': Former Marine says DOGE cuts tell veterans they’re 'dead weight or a burden' on US

Former and current federal employees are still reeling from dramatic layoffs by the Department of Government Efficiency. Doug Jackson, a veteran of the Marines, lost his probationary job doing public affairs at the Internal Revenue Service. The firings of thousands of workers at the IRS could potentially put tax filings in jeopardy. Jackson shared his experience with CNN’s Brianna Keilar on Monday.

“Federal government is a natural fit for a lot of veterans,” he said. “One of the first things you do when you become a civil servant is you raise your right hand and take the oath to support and defend the Constitution, and that's something that we all did when we wore the uniform. And I think it's an extension of our military service to continue serving in the federal government and looking out for the public interest.”

The firings, he said, are “not good on a personal level."

"It puts people's livelihood in jeopardy," Jackson said. "It turns their lives upside down. And so now they have to figure out how they're going to pay their bills, and now they have a new job, which is applying and networking. And so on an individual level, it's turning lives upside down with uncertainty.”

“But also on a larger scale, for an agency like the IRS, they need public affairs officers,” he added. “They need people who are expert communicators, who can reach the public in a meaningful way and explain new policies and even speak to the workforce. And so… it's going to have a negative effect. I can't imagine cutting people like me or anyone really across the IRS or the federal government is going to help the mission.”

Johnson mentioned that his coworker, a disabled veteran, was also fired. “What message does that send firing folks like that to the veteran community?” Keilar asked.

“I think the mass wave of fire of federal employees who have been fired by DOGE… sends two messages,” he said. “One, you know, it's telling veterans, ‘thank you for your service, but that's not enough. The government is in debt, and we also need to take your job.’ So that's one. And the second thing that I think it's telling veterans is that you are part of the problem, not the solution. And it suggests that as veterans working for the federal government, that we are somehow dead weight or a burden on the government. And I think that's a real shame.”

Keilar asked whether firings of workers at the IRS could have an impact on tax returns.

“I'm not sure,” Johnson said. “I mean, I wasn't an agent. I worked with others who were. I can't imagine that this is going to have a positive effect on turnaround time for returns. But like you said, there are other agencies affected, and the federal government already has a difficult time recruiting, retaining their workers, and so this is going to have a discouraging effect across the workforce.”

Watch the video below or at this link:

From Your Site Articles

Related Articles Around the Web

'Nobody is really in charge': DOGE leaves the Pentagon guessing as staff awaits firings

Leadership at the Pentagon is being “left in the dark” as the Department of Government Accountability makes sweeping changes — including firing federal employees — throughout the federal government, NOTUS reported Thursday. Centered around a strict hierarchy, the Defense Department is having to quickly adjust to DOGE’s chaotic style as employees wait for the firings to hit their agency.

The DOD said last week that they would be cutting 5,400 probationary workers and implementing a hiring freeze.

“Looking forward to working with you on this @elonmusk. Need to cut the fat," Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth posted on X earlier this month.

“Five sources at varying levels across the department told NOTUS that their leadership is still not informed on DOGE’s plan for civilian personnel,” NOTUS reporter John T. Seward writes. “The possible impacts and second-order effects of the anticipated firings could strain department tactical training, logistics, procurement and other activities that civilian DOD employees largely execute, sources said.”

Employees and leaders are keeping up to date on Musk and DOGE through the news and Musk’s website, X.

“Chain of command doesn’t think they’ll get a heads up when someone gets fired,” a Department of Defense employee told NOTUS. “On internal channels, they’ll tell you they don’t know what’s going on.”

Sen. Jack Reed (D-R.I.), the ranking member of the Senate Committee on Armed Services, told NOTUS that Congress was having trouble getting answers from the Pentagon. “We have, through our staff, been contacting [the Pentagon] and asking them for all the details, but they’re not forthcoming,” he said. “Some of this, I think, is: Nobody is really in charge.”

Sen. Thom Tillis told NOTUS (R-N.C.) said DOGE needed to defer to heads of departments. “There’s just got to be a rational basis for ‘the anticipated firings,’” he said. “Anytime you do things on a broad basis, and I’ve done things similar to this in my business experience, you’ve always got to be ready to do remediation.”

One tactical-level officer said that daily functioning has not changed, but there is a “sense of ambiguity,” Seward writes.

An officer working at one of the military service academies said that civilian instructors are feeling afraid due to Musk’s power.

“These folks gravitate towards the mission that we have, and I think a lot of them gravitate towards the stability of government jobs, at least to some degree,” the officer said. “And when you throw that stability out the window, and the mission sort of comes into question — because we’re supposed to be a non-partisan organization and it seems like certain mandates are very politically charged — it causes these folks to say ‘None of this is the reason I came here.’”

From Your Site Articles

Related Articles Around the Web

Farmers sound alarm as Trump's potential damage to food supply 'could be long-lasting'

President Donald Trump’s dramatic cuts have hit many parts of the federal government, but one worth paying particular attention to is reductions to agencies and programs that are working to protect plant and animal health, the New York Times reported Wednesday. Firings at the U.S. Department of Agriculture, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and the Food and Drug Administration could mean possible threats to food safety and animal health.

Emily Anthes and Apoorva Mandavilli write: “The damage could be long-lasting. Workers whose jobs were spared said that the upheaval had left them eyeing the exits, and graduate students said they were reconsidering careers in the federal government. The shrinking work force could also have far-reaching consequences for trade and food security and leave the nation unequipped to tackle future threats to plant and animal health, experts said.”

John Ternest was laid off from the USDA, where he was getting ready to study bee health and pollination. “These really were indiscriminate firings,” he told the Times. “We don’t know what we’ve lost until it’s potentially too late.”

Among fired USDA workers were people combating bird flu, but then their terminations were later rescinded. The agency was in the middle of hiring more people to work on the response, but the federal hiring freeze nixed the process.

Thousands of employees were laid off from the USDA, including about 400 people employed at its Animal and Plant Health Inspection Service. Some worked to combat invasive insects that killed plants, while others made sure that agriculture entering the country did not have pests or pathogens. There are reportedly already delays in U.S. ports due to the firings.

“Over the longer term,” Anthes and Mandavilli write, “if agricultural pests and pathogens found their way into the country, they could infest the nation’s homegrown crops, threatening food security and reducing demand for American agricultural products abroad.”

“If the United States gets a reputation for having dirty products, does that mean other countries will also, you know, step in and say, ‘Hey, we don’t want to buy your goods’?” an official said.

Another part of the department hit hard was the veterinary services program, which checks imported livestock for disease and is working to combat bird flu, while firings at the CDC could put pets at risk. The agency regulates the entry of animals to the United States.

“For example, the agency does not permit dogs that have recently been in countries with a high prevalence of rabies to enter the United States unless they have been vaccinated against the disease,” Anthes and Mandavilli write.

About half of the CDC employees at the port health stations were fired. Some stations are now unattended.

Firings at the FDA’s Center for Veterinary Medicine could also stymie the approval of new medicine for animals and allow dangerous products to be put on the market.

About 800 people were fired from the USDA Agricultural Research Service, which stopped a variety of research projects, such as a project looking at potato disease. And fired employees at the U.S. Meat Animal Research Center in Nebraska had been researching food safety and salmonella.

“We understand and respect the federal government’s desire to cut wasteful spending, but the truth of the matter is, U.S. MARC does not fall in that category,” the Nebraska Cattlemen Association said. The work at the center, “has potential to reduce costs for the beef industry long term and improve food safety for consumers.”

Some, but not all, of the scientists at the agency were reinstated.

“I think that people that want to earnestly do science are going to be viewing and remembering these decisions and how scientists are being treated,” said a scientist who was fired and rehired.

Secretary of Agriculture Brooke Rollins “fully supports President Trump’s directive to optimize government operations, eliminate inefficiencies and strengthen USDA’s ability to better serve American farmers, ranchers and the agriculture community,” a USDA spokesman said.

From Your Site Articles

Related Articles Around the Web

21 federal workers resign from Elon Musk's DOGE — refuse to 'dismantle critical public services'

As Elon Musk’s Department of Government Accountability moves to cut the federal government and fire workers, twenty-one employees are resigning, citing a refusal to “dismantle critical public services,” the Associated Press reported Tuesday.

“We swore to serve the American people and uphold our oath to the Constitution across presidential administrations,” the staffers, who were engineers, data scientists and product managers, wrote in a joint resignation letter, which the AP published. “However, it has become clear that we can no longer honor those commitments.”

The staffers worked for what was previously called the United States Digital Service, which was established during Barack Obama’s presidency.

“We will not use our skills as technologists to compromise core government systems, jeopardize Americans’ sensitive data, or dismantle critical public services,” they wrote. “We will not lend our expertise to carry out or legitimize DOGE’s actions.”

“I believe that Elon Musk is up to no good. And I believe that any data that he gains access to is going to be used for purposes that are inappropriate and harmful to Americans,” Jonathan Kamens, a DOGE engineer who was let go earlier this month, told the AP. Kamens thinks he was fired because he endorsed Vice President Kamala Harris in the 2024 presidential election.

“Unfortunately, to Musk this is probably a feature, not a bug,” Doug Fisher, former AP news editor, posted on X.

“Whatever they're planning is really bad to force a mass resignation like this,” Alejandra Caraballo, civil rights attorney and clinical instructor at Harvard’s Law Cyberlaw Clinic, posted on Bluesky.

Cordell Schachter, who until last month was the chief information officer at the U.S. Department of Transportation, took issue with the breakneck speed at which the Trump administration was moving. “‘Move fast and break things’ may be acceptable to someone who owns a business and owns the risk. And if things don’t go well, the damage is compartmentalized. But when you break things in government, you’re breaking things that belong to people who didn’t sign up for that,” he said.

From Your Site Articles

Related Articles Around the Web

Fired army veteran who worked in disaster recovery feels 'betrayed' and abandoned by Trump purge

An army veteran who is one of tens of thousands of workers fired from their jobs at the federal government feels abandoned and worries about his family’s health insurance, he told NPR in a report published Monday. The firing was part of the Trump administration’s purge of employees as part of an attempt to shrink the federal government.

Mike Macans was terminated two weeks ago from his position as a disaster recovery coordinator at the Small Business Administration in Anchorage, Alaska. He has not been able to get information he needs, like the documents to file for unemployment or the knowledge of when his family’s health insurance will end.

"I've never felt more betrayed in my entire life," Macans told NPR.

“Don't abandon and villainize the very people that have served this country and work to bring services to our citizens," he said.

“Now jobless, Macans' top concern is health insurance. His wife, a cancer survivor, needs costly medications to keep her autoimmune disorder under control. The couple have a 5-month-old and a toddler,” writes NPR correspondent Andrea Hsu.

"Just the disregard for the impact that this has, on not only the employee but his whole family, is astounding," Lara Macans, his wife, told NPR.

In his job, Macans provided help to communities in Alaska, Washington, Oregon and Idaho after disasters. "Alaska has every possible disaster threat you could think of, from volcanoes to hurricane to tsunami, earthquake, fire, flood — you name it," he said.

Macans was shocked when he learned he was fired. In his last evaluation, he was told he was “an exceptional asset to the Agency.”

"We had talked like — this is going to be your career. You're going to retire from this job," Lara Macans said. "That was really exciting."

After he was fired, Macans heard conflicting information. He got an email that the firing email was sent in error. Then, he received two emails saying he was indeed fired. "That is literally the last official correspondence regarding my employment status that I received from the SBA," he said. "There's absolutely no follow up." He added, "Because they fired me and then unfired me, I immediately started forwarding everything I could to my personal email.”

Now, Macans is looking to the future. "You know, family of four. We need a paycheck coming in, and we need health care," he said. "When it really comes down to it, I'll do whatever I need to do for them."

From Your Site Articles

Related Articles Around the Web

'No one knows who is in charge': White House’s HR email is creating 'bedlam' for federal workers

Confusion around President Donald Trump and Elon Musk’s layoffs caused chaos for government workers Monday, CNN reported. Over the weekend, workers received an email instructing them to detail what they had done the past week or risk losing their jobs. Some agency officials told workers to disregard the instructions. Trump called the idea “ingenious” and said workers who did not respond would be “sort of semi-fired” or “fired,” but then his administration’s Office of Personnel Management said that workers would actually not be fired for ignoring the email.

“Failure to respond will be taken as a resignation,” Musk threatened on X over the weekend.

“Our chief said it was mandatory. Then OPM said it became voluntary. Then I guess Trump just told us it was mandatory again,” a worker at the Department of Veterans Affairs told CNN. “No one knows who is in charge and who to listen to.”

“It’s bedlam,” said an employee who works at the IRS.

“Ironically, employees at OPM, the agency that sent the initial email, were left in the dark about how to handle the instructions themselves until about 6 p.m. Monday, when they finally got guidance saying a response was voluntary but strongly encouraged, according to an email obtained by CNN,” Tami Luhby, Rene Marsh, Ella Nilsen and Sunlen Serfaty reported.

Leaders at the Justice Department, State Department, Pentagon, FBI, Department of Homeland Security and the Department of Energy all told workers not to respond. The Commerce and Transportation Departments told staff to reply to their email by sending the information to their supervisors. NASA said it will respond for the agency, and workers do not have to respond individually.

Over the weekend, the National Air Traffic Controllers Association, the union for workers at the Federal Aviation Administration, said the move was a “distraction” for employees at a period when air traffic safety is “fragile.”

“Today was crazy. A lot of people were coming in from being off to try to send an email, a silly email that doesn’t even make any sense to us,” said David J. Demas, president of American Federation of Government Employees Local 3003, which represents prison workers. He had woken up at 3 a.m. Monday to texts and emails.

Then, just before 11 a.m., the DOJ said workers did not need to respond.

From Your Site Articles

Related Articles Around the Web

Trump firings of federal workers will 'absolutely' affect the economy: historian

President Donald Trump and Elon Musk’s mass layoffs in the federal government are going to have an impact on the economy, a historian said on CNN Tuesday.

Historian Leah Wright Rigueur, assistant professor of public policy at the Harvard Kennedy School of Government, noted that people often leave Washington, D.C. when administrations change, but “what I would be very careful about… is that there is a difference in how we are seeing the kind of explosion or transition, because it's not simply political appointees that we're seeing leave right now,” she said.

“We're seeing in mass these kind of much larger layoffs that affect career and civil employees who normally have not been part of these large mass layoffs that have happened so intimately and so fast that is absolutely going to have an effect on the economy, both the economy within Washington, DC, but larger economies that are dependent upon or have been integrated into the conversation around the federal government. The federal government plays an important role in the economy, and it's one that I think we've really overlooked in this larger conversation,” she added.

Earlier in the conversation, Kendra Barkoff, former press secretary to President Joe Biden, said that the layoffs were “causing chaos.”

“This is about power,” she said. “This is about control, and this is about causing mass chaos within a government who is supposed to be doing certain things… The Veterans Administration are supposed to be giving out what they deserve to get to their veterans. This is about causing chaos and the administration, and at the end of the day, who is responsible for this? You're already seeing some of the Cabinet Secretaries push back on this. There's just, there's a sense of just undue chaos, and this is all about the power.”

Rigueur also noted that President Bill Clinton had a program to cut the federal government, but he carried out the task much more carefully.

“Every administration has not only tried to cut costs, they've also tried to cut the federal bureaucracy,” she said, “and in fact, they've been pretty successful at doing it. Bill Clinton is a great example of this. Over the course of his two terms in office, he cut close to half a million people from the federal budget, and saved millions of dollars, and it was explicitly about efficiency and getting rid of waste and fraud.”

“However, he did it in a very specific manner,” she continued. “There was a task force that was led by Al Gore. It had 400 people on it, and so they would identify very carefully over the course of eight years: who are these people? What are they doing? And then we have very human conversations to limit the kind of harm that we are doing, because these are real people with real lives that also have details, very sensitive and important information.”

“The goal is not to cause chaos, which actually helps inefficiency. And so one of the things that we should be looking at in the way that we should be trying to understand DOGE, is that even as it is accounting for waste and bureaucracy and mismanagement and things like that, it is actually exacerbating those problems. So we should be evaluating that, and what are they doing? And how are they actually helping fraud or not helping fraud?” she asked.

Watch the video below or at this link:

From Your Site Articles

Related Articles Around the Web

'We are starting to worry': Economist sounds alarm on 'near-term downside' of 1 million DOGE layoffs

An economist is cautioning readers about the possible effects of President Donald Trump’s administration’s layoffs of federal workers on the economy. Torsten Sløk, chief economist at private equity firm Apollo, points out that “risks are intensifying.” Estimates of layoffs could be low, he notes, because they don’t include contractors who will be hit.

Derek Saul wrote at Forbes on Monday, “The layoffs from Elon Musk’s Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) could be much bigger than many expect, according to a prominent economist, who warned about DOGE-led ‘growing’ risks on the broader economy—and the markets, which President Donald Trump has always emphasized as a key barometer of his success.”

Sløk listed DOGE layoffs and increased uncertainty as causes for concern.

“We are starting to worry about the downside risks to the economy and markets from: 1) the impact of DOGE layoffs and contract cuts on jobless claims and 2) persistently elevated policy uncertainty weighing on capex [capital expenditure] spending decisions and hiring decisions,” Sløk wrote on Saturday.

Data shows more people filing for unemployment benefits in Washington, D.C., but not in Virginia, Maryland, and Washington, D.C. together.

Sløk estimated that total layoffs by DOGE could be around 300,000, which is not a huge number compared to the national unemployment of 7 million. But that number could be misleading. “Studies show,” he wrote, “that for every federal employee, there are two contractors. As a result, layoffs could potentially be closer to 1 million. Any increase in layoffs will push jobless claims higher over the coming weeks, and such a rise in the unemployment rate is likely to have consequences for rates, equities, and credit.”

“The largest amount of spending on federal contractors are at defense companies Lockheed Martin, RTX and General Dynamics, according to the System for Award Management,” Saul wrote.

“Credit spreads have not responded the way they normally do to rising policy uncertainty. Economic policy uncertainty is spiking higher, but credit spreads are not widening... The question is if persistently elevated policy uncertainty will begin to have a negative impact on capex spending and hiring decisions,” he added.

“The bottom line is that the incoming data remains strong… But the near-term downside risks to the economy and markets are growing,” Sløk wrote.

From Your Site Articles

Related Articles Around the Web

'The silliest thing I’ve seen in 40 years': 'Rift' grows between Musk and Trump appointees over email

Some leaders of government agencies told their employees over the weekend to disregard a request from Elon Musk that workers outline what they had done the previous week. The email was the latest step in an effort by Musk and President Donald Trump to purge the federal government of workers. Officials at the Pentagon, Federal Bureau of Investigation, State Department, Department of Homeland Security and Department of Energy told workers not to reply, CNN reported Sunday.

“A rift appeared to open Sunday between some of President Donald Trump’s agency heads and Elon Musk” write CNN’s Kevin Liptak, Tami Luhby and Natasha Bertrand. They later add: “The scramble to discern Trump and Musk’s exact intentions with the email added another layer of uncertainty to an already-rattled federal workforce. It seemed to set up a showdown between some agency heads — who were appointed by Trump himself, and who are all considered loyalists to his cause — and Musk, who has paid little mind to the strict chains of command that dictate life within the federal bureaucracy.”

“Failure to respond will be taken as a resignation,” Musk threatened on X.

Kash Patel, Trump’s new FBI director, was one of the first leaders to tell workers not to respond.

“The FBI, through the Office of the Director, is in charge of all of our review processes and will conduct reviews in accordance with FBI procedures,” Patel wrote. “When and if further information is required, we will coordinate the responses. For now, please pause any responses.”

Darin Selnick, acting undersecretary of defense for personnel and readiness at the DOD, wrote that these decisions were up to their own department.

“The Department of Defense is responsible for reviewing the performance of its personnel and will conduct any review in accordance with its own procedures,” he wrote Sunday. “When and if required, the department will coordinate responses to the email you have received from OPM. For now, please pause any response to the OPM email titled ‘What did you do last week.’”

Multiple senior officials at the DOD said the email “thrust their weekend into chaos,” according to CNN.

“It is the silliest thing I’ve seen in 40 years and completely usurps the chain of command,” a senior official at the Department of Defense told CNN. “That might be done elsewhere, but in the DoD it’s not done.”

“Anyone with the attitude of that Pentagon official needs to look for a new job,” Musk wrote on X in response.

The Department of Homeland Security’s deputy undersecretary for management, R.D. Alles, wrote in an email that “DHS management will respond on behalf of the department and all of its component offices,” adding, “No reporting action from you is needed at this time. For now, please pause any responses outside of your DHS chain of command.”

The acting undersecretary of management at the State Department sent a similar email: “The State Department will respond on behalf of the Department. No employee is obligated to report their activities outside their Department chain of command.”

The Trump administration has fired at least 20,000 federal employees, the Guardian reported Monday.

From Your Site Articles

Related Articles Around the Web

'Don't have access': Union president details 'unnecessary chaos' sparked by Trump HR email

An email from the Trump administration to federal agencies asking them to explain the work that they did the previous week “sent everybody scrambling,” the president of a federal workers’ union said Monday. Doreen Greenwald, president of the national treasury employees union, told CNN that the chain of command at federal agencies already accounts for what workers are doing each week.

The message, sent by the Office of Personnel Management, had the subject line, “What did you do last week?”

“Please reply to this email with approx. 5 bullets of what you accomplished last week and cc your manager. Please do not send any classified information, links, or attachments,” it reads.

“It sent everybody scrambling to first figure out, is it even a true email? And second of all, how should employees respond? And so it really caused a lot of unnecessary chaos over the weekend,” Greenwald said.

“Most federal employees don't have access to their government email during the weekend,” she added.

She said that the union has been trying to find answers. “We've been pushing back at agencies to get clarification on what their expectations are, because… OPM does not have direct line authority for these employees, and they're used to addressing the chain of command.”

“The chain of command knows exactly what employees are working on,” she continued. “They are the ones who assign their work duties. They track their leave, they track their time. So this email just caused a lot of confusion for really no purpose, because there are management chains in place to address these things.”

CNN host Pamela Brown asked about the buyout that the Trump administration had previously offered federal employees.

“So employees continue to be confused by these odd emails that are coming directly to them,” Greenwald said. “What we've heard and what has been reported in the media is that around 2% of the people took that offer. We advised against the offer because it really has no guarantees within it.”

She said that federal workers only make up a tiny amount of the federal budget.

“The federal workforce is less than 1% of the total federal budget, and somehow federal employees have been vilified as the problem behind what aches this country,” she said. “Everybody agrees that there could be efficiencies. They should be working with federal employees to identify areas where things could be improved and save money… they've sent just a shock wave through the entire civil service system. So this is not a matter of saving funds in any way. It's about disrupting the services of government.”

Watch the video below or at this link:

From Your Site Articles

Related Articles Around the Web

'Wrecking ball': Fired PA Trump voter says job cuts are 'destroying' lives 'for no reason'

Some of the federal workers caught up in the Trump administration’s widespread firings were Trump supporters. One of those workers, Robert McCabe, told NBC10 on Thursday that the president was destroying lives.

McCabe was one of 7,000 probationary workers who can expect to be laid off at the Internal Revenue Service, according to the Associated Press. Federal employees have also been laid off at the Department of Veterans Affairs, the Education Department, the Department of Health and Human Services, and elsewhere.

He “said he had been a supporter of President Trump prior to the layoff,” NBC10 reported.

“You know when he talks about government waste and all that, yes, I’m behind it,” McCabe said. “I believe there is a lot of stuff in the government that needs fixing. And that’s part of the reason why I actually wanted to work for the government, actually. To help change. Help change the things that are wrong in the world, you know?”

McCabe said he thought the cuts would look different.

“I thought that someone with his business acumen would have come in with a fine-tooth comb and actually found it instead of coming in with a wrecking ball and destroying people’s lives for no reason.”

He was one of 250 - 300 IRS workers laid off in Philadelphia Thursday.

“The letters are willfully incorrect and to our belief in NTEU unlawful," said Alex Jay Berman, the executive vice president of the National Treasury Employees Union Chapter 71 in Philadelphia. "They say essentially 'your ability, skills and performance do not make you a fit for federal employment. In addition, your performance is not up to par.' This is patently untrue. These are being all issued with the exact same wording to every single one of these probationary employees, whether they have just gotten out of training and had no performance metrics. Whether they have been here for almost their entire year and had very good performance appraisals.”

“The planned layoffs at the IRS would largely target workers at the 95,000-person agency who were hired as part of an expansion under former Democratic President Joe Biden, who had sought to expand enforcement efforts on wealthy taxpayers,” Reuters reported. “Trump's Republicans have blasted that effort, saying without evidence that middle-class Americans and small business owners would be the ones hardest hit.”

The fired workers include those working on making sure taxpayers follow the tax code, file returns, and pay taxes.

Watch the video below or at this link.

From Your Site Articles

Related Articles Around the Web

Why Trump’s economic policy will '100 percent' come 'back to bite him': expert

Americans are worried about the economy and President Donald Trump’s policies are raising inflation despite his campaign promises, Rana Foroohar, CNN’s global economic analyst, said Friday.

“His policies from tariffs to limits on immigration, rounding up migrants, whether you like it or not, more immigration has been responsible for lower wage inflation, and just the general geopolitical stress and uncertainty is actually increasing risk premiums. It's raising inflation,” she said.

Consumers became less confident in the economy between January and Feburary, a report from the University of Michigan found. “People were concerned about spending and buying and prices because of tariffs,” said CNN correspondent Vanessa Yurkevich.

“Folks feeling more pessimistic about the economy, that is a turn from how they felt over the summer, when people were feeling pretty good about the direction of the economy,” she added.

“Could Trump's lack of apparent focus right now on lowering prices come back and bite him sooner rather than later?” asked CNN host Pamela Brown.

“Well, 100 percent,” Foroohar said, “and this gets into one of the challenges for the Trump administration, but it was also something that Biden struggled with when you want to make a fundamental change in the economy, when you want to shift to an economy that, frankly, for the last 50 years has been all about lowering prices and jacking up stock prices, and suddenly you want to change it to something that's much more about producing things at home, creating creating better jobs. That's a great goal, but that's something that takes years and decades, and during that time, there are periods of real pain, and they have to be well managed.”

“I think that there's a sense that with all the sort of high speed moves this administration is making, that the markets are really not sure how this change is going to be managed, both at an economic or a political level,” she added.

Watch the video below or at this link:

From Your Site Articles

Related Articles Around the Web

'Helpless' GOP lawmakers dislike Trumps 'indiscriminate firing' — but fear the White House won’t listen

Some Republicans in Congress are increasingly concerned by the Trump administration’s widespread firings of federal workers, especially veterans and employees working on the bird flu outbreak. But as they reach out to the White House, they’re feeling “helpless."

“For the most part, Republican members are publicly cheering the administration’s push to slash the federal government, which is being led by billionaire tech mogul Elon Musk with Trump’s blessing. But privately, many are feeling helpless to counter the meat-ax approach that has been embraced so far, with lawmakers especially concerned about the dismissal of military veterans working in federal agencies as well as USDA employees handling the growing bird flu outbreak affecting poultry and dairy farms,” Meredith Lee Hill reported at Politico Thursday.

“Certainly on the veterans side, we’re asking for information from the administration,” Senate Veterans Affairs Chair Jerry Moran (R-Kan.) told Politico. “We are being reassured that no one at the [Department of Veterans Affairs] who has any direct care responsibilities are being terminated or laid off, and we’re just looking for the positions and circumstances in which it’s occurring.”

Moran said he and his staff have been in touch with the White House and VA Secretary Doug Collins. Other Republicans feel that agency officials don’t have the power to stop the layoffs, so they are focusing on just the White House.

These Republicans have had a small bit of success. For example, when the Trump administration fired employees at the U.S. Department of Agriculture working on bird flu, GOP lawmakers “complained to the White House legislative affairs team and other Trump officials,” Hill writes. After, the USDA reversed some of the firings.

“I thought we were supposed to be in a new era of meritocracy. Not the indiscriminate firing of people,” a Republican congressional aide told Politico.

Lawmakers are concerned about whether these changes will cost them in the next congressional races.

“I worry what his plans are,” one GOP lawmaker said of the possibility that the Department of Government Accountability would cut Medicare and Medicaid.

The administration is “already uncovering waste, fraud, and abuse across federal agencies and ensuring better stewardship of taxpayer dollars, including for American farmers and families,” a White House spokesperson said.

GOP lawmakers will get involved “if there are things that we think that need to be addressed” or if there are issues “perhaps they’re not considering when they make these decisions,” Senate Majority Leader John Thune told reporters Wednesday.

“Thune added he thought it was key ‘that we don’t undermine important services,’ including health and safety. But he put his support behind the administration’s efforts to give the federal government a careful ‘scrub’ with the goal of a more limited presence,” Hill writes.

Other Republicans have been more supportive of the cuts.

“What Elon and the team are doing is what Congress has not had the ability to do. … They are exposing this massive fraud, waste and abuse that we have not been unable to uncover because the deep state has hidden it from us,” Speaker Mike Johnson said at the Conservative Political Action Conference on Thursday.

From Your Site Articles

Related Articles Around the Web

'Traitor': Trump-friendly union leader blasted for 'shameful' cozying up to GOP

International Brotherhood of Teamsters President Sean O'Brien faced backlash from labor movement voices on Wednesday for expressing his support for U.S. President Donald Trump's pick to lead the Department of Labor and for appearing to take a softer stance on so-called "right-to-work" laws—policies generally decried by organized labor because they allow employees to opt out of union expenses while working at a unionized establishment.

Labor journalist Alex Press called his comments regarding right-to-work "shameful" and "embarrassing."

Over the summer, Press spoke with rank-and-file Teamsters members about recent actions from O'Brien that signal a rightward shift, such as his decision to headline the first night of the 2024 Republican National Convention. "Some are undoubtedly thrilled," wrote Press, though "a growing number of members believe their president is offering a straightforward, if not always explicit, endorsement of a political party that wants to destroy them."

On Wednesday, O'Brien attended the Senate confirmation hearing of Oregon Republican Lori Chavez-DeRemer, Trump's labor pick, during which Chavez-DeRemer said she would support Trump's agenda, according to The New York Times. Chavez-DeRemer also told senators that she no longer supports a section of the Protecting the Right to Organize (PRO) Act—sweeping Democratic labor legislation that was introduced in Congress but never passed—which would have weakened state right-to-work laws.

Speaking later Wednesday on Fox News, O'Brien said of Chavez-DeRemer, "Not only do we support her appointment, we are going to the mat to make sure that she gets confirmed."

When asked about Chavez-DeRemer's stance on the right-to-work section of the PRO Act, O'Brien said that he is working with senators such as Sen. Josh Hawley (R-Mo.) to come up with a version of the PRO Act that "may not include that."

"That's the beauty of having conversations with people from the other side, where you can collaborate and actually find out what works for that state, what doesn't work for it—but more importantly, what's going to work for the American worker," O'Brien said.

A clip of these comments was reposted by the National Right to Work Committee, a group dedicated to "combating the evils of compulsory unionism," according to its website.

"The Teamsters union is as decentralized as the country. Like the median voter, most Teamsters aren't closely following what Sean O'Brien is saying," wrote labor journalist Luis Feliz Leon in response. "The press should ensure they know how he's selling out members to cozy up to anti-worker politicos and bolstering the power of bosses."

In the same Fox News interview, O'Brien also said the Teamsters do not want to see anyone losing their job, but that "[Trump] thinks he's within his right," when asked about the personnel-slashing Department of Government Efficiency and the Trump administration's widely decried deferred resignation program for nearly all federal employees. Multiple federal employees unions are currently battling the Trump administration in court over its actions targeting federal workers and federal agencies.

"What a shame. Teamsters deserve better than this," wrote Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-N.Y.) in response on Bluesky.

Another labor journalist, Kim Kelly, denounced a video posted Wednesday by Sen. Markwayne Mullin (R-Okla.)—whom O'Brien nearly physically fought during a Senate hearing last year—in which Mullin and O'Brien chum it up and both express support for Chavez-DeRemer.

Also in response to the video, an observer on X with username katy, who indicates they are a part UFCW Local 371, wrote, "class traitor."

"I was raised in a Teamsters household, survived because of union benefits, and still do. I'd rather starve than lick a boot," katy wrote. "We're the union."

From Your Site Articles