At least 20,000 federal workers have taken Trump's buyout offer as deadline nears

WASHINGTON ― At least 20,000 federal employees have accepted the buyout offer President Donald Trump made to the entire federal workforce before Thursday's deadline, a White House official said Tuesday.

That represents about 1% of the more than 2 million federal employees, below the White House's goal for 5% to 10% to accept buyouts.

But the White House official said the number of deferred resignations is "rapidly growing," and the White House expects the largest spike in sign-ups to come 24 to 48 hours before the deadline.

More: Donald Trump offers eight-month buyouts to all federal employees

Axios first reported the number of accepted buyouts.

In a push to drastically reduce the size of the federal workforce, the U.S. Office of Personnel Management last Tuesday offered all federal employees eight months of pay and benefits through September if they resign by Feb 6., this Thursday.

The offer, which came in a mass email to all employees, is part of billionaire tech entrepreneur Elon Musk's efforts to gut the federal bureaucracy and reshape the government through the Department of Government Efficiency he leads.

Federal employees who want to remain in the federal workforce were told via email they must return to in-person work, embrace new "performance standards" and be "reliable, loyal and trustworthy" in their work. The email also warned that most federal departments and agencies will be "downsized through restructurings, realignments, and reductions in force."

Layoffs across the federal government are "likely" if not enough employees take the buyout, Erv Koehler, assistant commissioner of general supplies and services at General Services Administration, said in an email to GSA staff reported Tuesday by the Washington Post.

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The buyout offer to federal workers came in an email titled "Fork in the Road," the same subject line Musk used in 2022 when he gave employees of Twitter a similar ultimatum after buying the social media company and changing its name to X.

The offer to employees was met with widespread confusion because the initial email didn't explicitly say that federal workers wouldn't be expected at work if they accepted the "deferred resignation" offer. Democrats have warned federal employees not to accept the offer, arguing Trump can't be trusted.

In a follow-up email titled "Fork in the Road FAQs," the Office of Personnel Management clarified employees are not expected to work during the deferred resignation period and can accept a job elsewhere while still getting paid through September.

Musk and his aides have swiftly moved into federal departments and gained access to Treasury Department human resources computer systems which contain the personal data of millions of federal employees. Reuters reported career civil servants have been locked out of these systems.

Reach Joey Garrison on X @joeygarrison.

This article originally appeared on USA TODAY: Over 20,000 federal workers have taken Trump's buyout offer