WASHINGTON ― About 75,000 federal employees accepted President Donald Trump’s buyout offer, which is closed to applicants as of Wednesday night.
The final buyout tally comes after a federal judge lifted a pause on the program earlier in the day. The figure, confirmed by an Office of Personnel Management official, represents about 3.3% of the federal government’s 2.3 million workers.
That’s below the White House’s projections of 5% to 10% of the workforce who were expected to accept the buyouts.
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A federal judge in Massachusetts on Wednesday restored Trump’s buyout project, dubbed “Fork in the Road,” deciding federal employees unions that sued to stop the program lacked standing to bring their challenge and that his court does not have jurisdiction to hear their complaint.
The judge lifted his pause on the buyouts that he first issued last week and denied the plaintiffs’ request for an injunction, allowing the Trump administration to move forward with the buyouts. Shortly after the judge’s order, the Trump administration closed the program to new applicants effective 7 p.m. ET Wednesday night.
Trump’s offer ‒ extended Jan. 28 to virtually the entire federal workforce ‒ promised eight months of pay and benefits to federal employees through September in exchange for their immediate resignation. Democrats warned federal workers not to trust the deal, noting that federal government is not funded beyond March 14.
Federal employees who chose to continue to work in the federal government are required to return in-person work and embrace new “performance standards” and be “reliable, loyal and trustworthy” in their work, among other new “reforms” across the government.
The buyouts are part of billionaire tech entrepreneur’s Elon Musk’s Department of Government Efficiency, which Trump has empowered to cut spending and gut the federal bureaucracy.
The Trump administration has signaled furloughs and layoffs are likely if not enough federal workers agree to the buyouts.
On Tuesday, Trump signed an executive order instructing heads of federal departments and agencies to undertake plans for “large-scale reductions in force.” Layoffs started Wednesday at the General Services Administration, the agency which manages the federal government’s real estate portfolio, Reuters reported.
