How have the wild initial months of Donald Trump’s return to the White House landed on Washington? We asked the people who live and work here to tell us—in their own words.
Today, we hear from two former workers at the United States Digital Service, which effectively has been taken over by Elon Musk’s so-called Department of Government Efficiency. Both workers asked to remain anonymous. (Editor’s note: the following interview has been lightly edited for space and clarity).
What was it like to find out that the USDS would become DOGE?
USDS worker No. 1: I was completely shocked on Inauguration Day when the executive order came out that we were to become DOGE. And then later that night, we were getting messages that we were going to get interviewed the next day by DOGE. Those interviews set a really bad tone. They were pretty hostile. If folks tried to make it more conversational, like you often try to do in an interview, things would get kind of hostile, like, “we’re interviewing you, not the other way around.”
And even just the questions asked. The first question I was asked was, “What makes you exceptional? What are you the best in the world at?” Just an interesting way to start. Then I got, “Who are the best, who are the most exceptional people at USDS?” But other colleagues got, “Who are some of the worst people?”—as in, “Who should we fire?” It felt like they were trying to turn us against each other to some degree.
And then the last question was, “What do you think of DOGE?” I would give a very different answer if you asked me that question today than I did on the first full day of the administration, when we didn’t know exactly what they were going to do.
What did you make of the Trump administration’s “Fork in the Road” email offering federal employees a choice between resigning with temporary pay and benefits or staying on and possibly being fired?
USDS worker No. 2: We were all being encouraged to take the Fork in the Road, but they wouldn’t give us any concrete information about it. They wouldn’t answer any of our questions about it. It was just, “You should take it. You should take it. It’s definitely real. We’re definitely going to honor the terms. Definitely, definitely.”
It was impossible to evaluate the risk of either choice. Right? I couldn’t evaluate what the percentage likelihood of the deferred resignation offer being legitimate was. Nothing like that had ever been done before in government. No one knew what the laws were. No one knew what the courts were going to let them get away with. No one knew whether Congress was going to let them get away with it. At the same time, you also can’t evaluate the risk of staying. Like if I stay, am I going to get to keep my job? What are the odds? Who knows? Nobody knows because they wouldn’t tell us.
So what it came down to for me was, the only thing I know for certain is that Elon Musk wants me to take the deferred resignation offer—and if Elon wants it, it’s probably a bad thing. So, I didn’t take the offer because Elon Musk wanted me to take the offer. That’s what it came down to.
What happened next?
USDS worker No. 1: It’s Valentine’s Day, and a little bit after 7 PM, my phone starts blowing up with people saying, “Oh, no, I was fired.” “I was fired.” You find out people are getting emails to their personal email addresses. And so everyone’s sitting there for like two hours just checking their emails, like, “am I fired, too?” Even our leadership were not given a list of people who were fired. They had to reconstruct it by talking to people. [DOGE] ended up firing pretty close to a third of our colleagues that night.
USDS worker No. 2: There were 44 of us that were all fired from the US Digital Service on the same day. And they started sending out the notifications at seven o’clock on a Friday night because that’s the pattern that they use for the stuff, because they’re jerks.
USDS worker No. 1: [The following] Tuesday at a staff meeting is the first time anyone from DOGE really had showed up to our meetings since the inauguration. They were like, “we’re going to meet with all your project teams this week,” and it’s like, “well, wouldn’t that have been nice before you fired people?”
I think the thing that was most telling and most hurtful was that they didn’t even really acknowledge, like genuinely acknowledge, the fact that we were mourning the loss of our colleagues who they had just terminated on Friday. It was the first day back after that happened, and the DOGE leadership did not acknowledge the fact that they just terminated our colleagues, and for no good reason. These were super-talented individuals.
What was the atmosphere in the workplace like?
USDS worker No. 1: I remember one day—I feel like it was only the second week of the administration—I showed up to a meeting and half of the people weren’t there. It was because it was a team of contractors, and their contract had gotten cut by DOGE. I just remember crying. None of us had received notice that this was happening. They were in the middle of working on important things. Like they’re just poof, gone?
[Later], I would show up to meetings with my agency partners and they would just be so happy. They’re like, “You’re still here!” Any day, DOGE could have moved me to a different project or simply fired me.
How would you characterize your experiences during the first 100 days of the administration?
USDS worker No. 2: It’s just sad. I spent a long time working in the private sector before I went into government service. This was my first government service job, and I thought I was going to stay there for the rest of my career, because I finally found a job where I could literally serve the public. That’s not going to be the case. So that was sad.
My second reaction, after I kind of got over the sadness or moved past the sadness, was kind of just anger. I think a lot of other feds are feeling this way, too. I am angry that these people who are running the federal government right now are being allowed to destroy so much, being allowed to destroy so many things that actually help people. And I’m still angry. I tend to spray that anger in all kinds of different directions—I’m angry at Elon Musk, and I’m angry at Donald Trump, and I’m angry at the Republicans in Congress who are letting them get away with everything, and I’m angry at the Democrats who aren’t doing enough to fight back. I’m angry at the people who didn’t vote in 2024 and let Trump win. I’m angry at a lot of different people.
USDS worker No. 1: My experience in the first 100 days was definitely traumatic. I know [Office of Management and Budget Director] Russell Vought said he wanted federal employees to be traumatized. Well, good job, Russell Vought. You succeeded.
