THE WASHINGTON POST: What’s being lost with the DOGE cuts? These fired feds can tell you.

One was the person behind the welcome desk at a Massachusetts Veterans Affairs outreach centre, the first face struggling veterans saw when they came for help. Another was the Energy Department employee responsible for knowing the thousand-page permit required for the disposal of hazardous waste. Another, the U.S. Forest Service employee responsible for hiring local teenagers each summer to keep forest trails clean.

Doctors and scientific researchers. Data analysts looking for spending efficiencies at the Education Department. Building managers responsible for finding the best air filters for a Centers for Disease Control and Prevention campus in Georgia. All these people, along with tens of thousands of other federal workers, lost their jobs in recent weeks as the Trump administration has rapidly shrunk the federal workforce in the name of cutting “fraud, waste and abuse.”

Spearheaded by Elon Musk’s U.S. DOGE Service, the first round of dismissals hit probationary federal employees on Feb. 13. Many found out via emails that told them their jobs were no longer “in the public interest.” DOGE has since ordered large-scale reductions in force that would also terminate senior staff members.

As President Donald Trump laid out in his address to Congress last week, the cuts are a pillar of his second term.

“For nearly 100 years, the federal bureaucracy has grown until it has crushed our freedoms, ballooned our deficits and held back America’s potential in every possible way,” Trump said. “My administration will reclaim power from this unaccountable bureaucracy, and we will restore true democracy to America again.”

As the country’s largest employer, the federal government touches nearly every corner of American life. The DOGE cuts could drastically alter the government’s role and reach, redefining how it serves the people.

The Washington Post spoke to workers who explained their roles - and what the country is losing with the elimination of those jobs.

‘It felt almost like a continuation of my military service’

• Jared Blockus, 30, Fayetteville, North Carolina
• Department of Veterans Affairs

On Jared Blockus’s first day as an administrative officer at the Department of Veterans Affairs, the words of the oath rang familiar: “I will support and defend the Constitution … bear true faith and allegiance to the same.” He realized that federal workers took nearly an identical oath to the one he said in 2017, when he kicked off his career in the Army.

“It felt almost like a continuation of my military service. As a veteran, I was going to work with veterans,” said Blockus, 30. “You couldn’t ask for a better opportunity to keep serving the country.”

Blockus had spent six and a half years as a defense artillery officer. After getting married and having two children, he wanted a civilian job that would give him the same purpose and mission. He found that in his role, which he began in March 2024.

Blockus’s job was to keep the back-office machinery running so doctors and nurses could provide the best care for patients. His duties included budgeting, scheduling payroll, making sure doctors had enough time to spend with patients and purchasing medical equipment, from EKG machines to echocardiograms.

“The doctors, they know exactly what equipment they need,” he said. “It’s my job to make sure that they get it.”

Blockus was nearing the end of his one-year probationary period when he got his termination notice. The email said his termination was “based on his performance.” Yet the only performance review he had received, in June, rated him as “outstanding.”

In an email, VA press secretary Pete Kasperowicz said the February firings across the department “will not hurt VA health care, benefits or beneficiaries.”

Kasperowicz noted that Blockus’s duties are now “being covered by other staff members.”

For Blockus, the termination stung even more because he voted for Trump in the 2024 presidential election. Despite being a registered Democrat, he said he made the choice based on the economy. It was a vote he immediately regretted the night of the email.

“If they had been more clear in the campaign about what they wanted to do, I’m not sure he would have the same amount of votes that he did,” he said.

‘This takes the edge off American technology’

• Neesha Regmi Schnepf, 33, Golden, Colorado
• Interior Department

As a research scientist at the U.S. Geological Survey, Neesha Regmi Schnepf’s job involved imagining the possibilities of one catastrophic “what-if”: how geomagnetic storms could upset American life.

Remember last year when the northern lights splashed across the sky in the Lower 48 states? That was the product of a “severe” geomagnetic storm triggered by blasts of plasma from the sun - a phenomenon that can provoke massive upheaval to the electric grid and communications. In 1989, a large storm knocked out the grid in Montreal. In 2003, a similar storm disabled Sweden’s power access. Schnepf’s job was to study such events, in hopes of providing information that could insulate U.S. systems from catastrophe.

“This is going to happen more and more in the next handful of years,” said Schnepf, 33. “And our society now relies more on satellites and our electric grid than ever before. So we are going to need to understand this.”

Schnepf started working for the federal government in June on a one-year probationary period. Her work had national security implications that the government had previous acknowledged as critical — the country’s defenses and communications could easily be crippled by the exact events she studied — so Schnepf had hoped her role would be safe.

Then she got her termination email.

“Really, these firings could make the country less prepared for these hazards that could happen,” Schnepf said. “This takes the edge off American technology and military preparedness.”

J. Elizabeth Peace, a senior public affairs specialist at the Interior Department, said in an email that the department does “not comment on personnel” but added that “research work within USGS continues.”

‘I make sure they know where they can get that help’

• Erin Williamson, 46, Burien, Washington
• Agriculture Department

Erin Williamson’s job involved long-haul drives across empty stretches of Washington state, trips of up to 200 to 300 miles at a time to reach communities in remote pockets of the Pacific Northwest.

As a community economic development representative for the Agriculture Department’s Rural Development agency, Williamson, 46, served as a bridge between tiny communities and the federal government.

The federal government offers a smorgasbord of grants, financing aid and funding opportunities for small-town improvement projects. But those options are so buried within programs and agencies, it can be hard for local officials to know that they exist.

“My job was to show up in a small town and make sure people in that town have help if they need it,” she said. “If they need help to put in broadband service, I make sure they know where they can get that help.”

Williamson entered the federal workforce in her 40s after a career in business. For 10 years she owned a coffee shop and cold brew company. She eventually sold the business and worked in private sector economic development. A job with the federal government meant a 5 percent pay cut and leaving better benefits for the opportunity to have a wider impact.

“I don’t want to sound starry-eyed, but I joined for the bigger-picture mission,” she said.

She started in January, but immediately knew she had made the right decision. She was helping, Williamson felt.

Williamson was shocked when she was terminated. The Agriculture Department did not respond to a request for comment.

“There’s no patriotic or America-centred reason why this was done,” she said. “It’s like this was designed to hurt the citizens of the country.”

She’ll be fine - she hopes. But Williamson is more concerned about the communities she worked with. She had been helping a town of about 160 residents finance a clean water system. “There’s no way to fund that through the private sector,” she said. “That’s where Rural Development comes in.”

Now, would there be anyone to make that long-haul drive through empty stretches of Washington state to help?

‘Accidents are bound to happen’

• Marcus Cooper, 27, Washington, D.C.
• Transportation Department

Marcus Cooper didn’t know that when he accepted a job in the Transportation Department’s Pipeline and Hazardous Materials Safety Administration, it would feel like his calling.

“I felt like I hit the lottery,” Cooper said. It was his first “real job” following his master’s program in chemistry. He soon wanted to make a career out of the role, hoping to work as a public servant for years to come.

As a chemist, Cooper was part of a team that approved some of the 1.2 million daily shipments of hazardous material, including mining and military explosives, and boosters for rockets. He also routinely served as a subject-matter expert for international hazardous material regulations.

“It is a piece of public safety that I would say people are not aware of,” Cooper said.

He had just passed the 10-month mark when he heard about probationary staff being fired.

The first email he received about his termination misstated his role. Then a second one came in. Within 30 minutes, his email, badge and login stopped working.

“It was a gut punch,” Cooper said. “You could just tell it was a copy-paste template.”

Cooper was routinely told by his supervisors that he was doing well. His supervisor knew nothing about the layoffs, he said.

Cooper worries that, with fewer people doing approvals, the hazardous materials transportation process won’t be as safe and could take more time.

“Without making sure that things are safe to be transported … accidents are bound to happen,” Cooper said.

A Transportation Department spokesperson said the agency will not compromise on safety and that the office is equipped to handle fluctuations in staffing due to turnover. The agency said it ensured that the recent cuts “did not impact any role pertaining to critical safety functions” and that the remaining staff is “meeting existing and anticipated hazardous materials safety needs.”

‘We already know all of these things work’

• Arielle Kane, 37, Washington, D.C.
• Department of Health and Human Services

Arielle Kane joined the federal government in May to help launch a project aimed at reducing maternal mortality. The work came at a time when childbirth is deadlier in the United States than other high-income nations.

Fourteen states, including Mississippi, West Virginia and Wisconsin, as well as Washington, D.C., are participating in the pilot program, which is run by the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services’ Innovation Center and is slated to run for 10 years.

Kane, along with her colleagues, had begun working with state Medicaid programs to find ways to improve maternal health care, such as by increasing access to midwives and ensuring pregnant patients with conditions like hypertension and diabetes get better preventive care. Over the long term, the health-care financing model aims to incentivise providers to offer quality maternal care and reduce costs to Medicaid.

“We already know all of these things work, so why aren’t all of these women getting [these services],” said Kane, who served as an analyst. “That’s why the project was launched.”

The project had recently gotten off the ground when she received an email on Feb. 15 notifying her of her termination. Four people were fired out of the roughly dozen who worked on the project full time, she said. Two others left at the end of February.

“I was really excited about being there,” she said, “and doing work that was meaningful.”

Kane said she is worried about the future of the project.

“I don’t know what’s going to happen,” she said. “But what I am worried about is that our team is being decimated.”

A CMS spokeswoman said the agency does not comment on personnel matters. Asked whether the work would continue, the spokeswoman wrote in an email that the Innovation Center is conducting a “comprehensive review” of every health-care model the centre runs and is “well-positioned to support Secretary Kennedy’s agenda, helping Americans live healthier lives while protecting the taxpayer.”

‘We were the extra set of eyes’

• Stephanie Sterling, 36, Anchorage
• Fish and Wildlife Service

Stephanie Sterling was familiar with the hands-on part of archaeology. In 2021, as a master’s student in the maritime studies program at East Carolina University, she was one of the experts strapping into diving gear and combing the seafloor between the Florida Keys and Cuba for the lost wreck of a 200-year-old Spanish slave ship.

Her work as an archaeologist continued with internships and seasonal positions with the federal government, including a job at Glacier Bay National Park and Preserve in southeastern Alaska. In November, the Nebraska native started a job with the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service in Anchorage. She joined an office with two other federal workers who were responsible for 16 wildlife refuges across the state, amounting to around 78 million acres of land.

Land use on the wildlife refuges is tightly wrapped in legal red tape. Any construction - for example if a dock needs to be repaired or a new bunkhouse has to be constructed to house workers or researchers - must pass a series of legal requirements: Is the proposed construction on tribal land? If so, does it follow the correct requirements? Are the correct archaeological and environmental impact reports filed? Sterling and her team walked builders through the process.

“There’s a misconception of what we do, and oftentimes people feel that we’re there to stop a project,” said Sterling, 36. “We don’t want to stop it. We want to work together as a team to make this project happen as smoothly as possible and on time.”

On the day Trump took office, the White House issued an executive order to “immediately reverse the punitive restrictions” in Alaska and encourage development of its resources.

Despite pausing protective actions put in place by the Biden administration and encouraging further deregulation, the executive order did not completely rescind regulation, change the regulatory fine-print requirements of projects already in progress or cancel other legal requirements. Sterling felt her team’s work guiding development was more important than ever. The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service did not respond to a request for comment on Sterling’s termination.

“It already was tough working as a skeleton crew,” she said. “We were the extra set of eyes on this. I’m very worried for some of these large-scale plans that either have been alluded to or … are even kind of ongoing right now.”

‘My ultimate goal was to get to the federal government’

• Melinda Townsend-Breslin, 48, Louisville
• Department of Housing and Urban Development

Melinda Townsend-Breslin had been on the other side of the federal grant process’s mazelike requirements. For years she worked as a staffer at local housing authorities in Kentucky, deciphering the fine print attached to how federal money must be used on the local level.

Having become fluent working as a recipient, Townsend-Breslin, 48, wanted to work on the other side.

“My ultimate goal was to get to the federal government. Housing to me is a basic right and need. And that’s what the federal government helps do with their funds.”

Townsend-Breslin started a job at HUD as a portfolio management specialist in June. The position involved working with 15 housing authorities across Kentucky, making sure local officials used federal money correctly. That meant knowing the details of all the relevant contract documents, keeping up with every change in HUD policy that would change those requirements and informing local leaders about them.

Townsend-Breslin felt she was in an office where her expertise affected communities across the state. “The joke was that you didn’t go for the finest coffee. But the whole team wanted to be there. We worked around-the-clock.”

Kasey Lovett, HUD’s head of public affairs, said in an email that the department would “not comment on individual personnel.”

Townsend-Breslin’s office was already understaffed. She worries that no one will be there to answer questions from agencies receiving government funding. “We were the guardrails,” she said.

Correction: A previous version of this article incorrectly said that a U.S. Forest Service employee was responsible for hiring teenagers to maintain National Park trails. The employee is responsible for hiring teenagers to maintain forest trails. The article has been corrected.

© 2025 , The Washington Post