Supreme Court Tests Agency Chiefs’ Resolve on Workforce Cuts (1)

Federal agency leaders still face obstacles to implementing widespread layoffs, and some are even reversing course after the Supreme Court greenlit President Donald Trump‘s order to cut the public workforce.

The high court stayed the farthest-reaching injunction blocking multiple federal agencies from cutting workers, but some departments are reversing course in planned layoffs, or still face legal challenges to them. Trump’s Department of Government Efficiency, tasked with cutting the size of the government, is also now without its most notable leader, billionaire Elon Musk.

In Musk’s absence, agency heads are showing signs of being more empowered to make their own decisions on cost-cutting, said one official with the American Federation of Government Employees, who spoke on the condition of anonymity because the union is still assessing the impact. Union leaders remain hopeful—for now—that Trump’s advisers will be more restrained, and that future cuts won’t be as bad as they feared, the official said.

In briefs filed as part of the legal challenge to Trump’s layoff order, a group of public sector unions said they represent nearly 1 million federal employees who face possible termination.

“Individual agencies are free to make up their own minds,” said David Nesting, a former technology adviser for the Office of Management and Budget, who was terminated in February. “What’s new now is a more significant amount of time has passed, so agencies have had time to internalize feedback, have had time for people to assert their roles.”

Trump himself said he regrets some of DOGE’s early actions.

“We could have done it differently,” Trump said during a Cabinet meeting July 8. “I would have done it differently, a little bit, maybe.”

Agencies Respond

The US Department of Veterans Affairs, abandoned its plan for mass layoffs this week, sparing 50,000 jobs and instead focusing on attrition as a means for further staff reductions. Voice of America also withdrew layoff notices amid a union dispute days after the federal hiring office dialed back essay questions that were criticized for their partisan tilt.

Lawmakers moved Thursday to protect the National Weather Services from future layoffs.

The US Department of Labor, in a statement July 9, suggested it had no immediate plans terminate more workers. The agency has already cut its workforce by 20%, “achieving our goal to promote efficiency and eliminate redundancies, while retaining critical positions that fulfill our core mission of putting American workers first,” spokeswoman Courtney Parella Spencer said.

The staff cut at DOL came largely from voluntary resignations.

Some agencies aren’t done cutting. The US Department of Homeland Security plans to cut “non-mission-critical positions and bureaucratic hurdles,” Assistant Secretary Tricia McLaughlin told Bloomberg Government, without offering details. The department began mass layoffs in February.

Reversing Course

While the Supreme Court order only allowed layoffs to move forward temporarily, any cuts will be hard to reverse.

The Trump administration has already gutted entire agencies, such as the US Agency for International Development, and pledged to shut down the US Department of Education. Tens of thousands of federal workers have already quit, been laid off, or accepted deferred resignation offers.

Trump has extended a federal hiring freeze until Oct. 15.

“If, on the off chance, that at the end of the day the decision comes out differently, it’s kind of too late because everyone’s already been fired,” Jane Manners, a legal historian at Temple University, said.

The US Department of State announced plans Thursday to cut an unspecified number of US-based diplomats and other staff, saying it would target Cold War-era offices ill-equipped for Trump’s “America First” policy vision and consolidate redundant human resources, finance, and accounting jobs.

The US Department of Housing and Urban Development will not halve its staff, contrary to what the agency’s union president said in February, spokeswoman Kasey Lovett said.

Still, “HUD is always examining ways to best optimize its workforce” she added.

New Leadership

The Supreme Court ruling also came just before Scott Kupor, a Silicon Valley investment banker, won Senate confirmation to lead the Office of Personnel Management.

Kupor previously worked for a firm headed by Marc Andreessen, a Trump donor who advised DOGE and was heavily involved in the transition.

Kupor told the Senate panel on governmental affairs in April that he would support “surgical” cuts that respect the “dignity and humanity” of federal workers.

But he also promised to “help do the heavy lifting” to get the US on a more sustainable financial path.