Musk ‘What Did You Do’ Email Draws Suit From Federal Unions (1)

Unions representing thousands of federal employees sued the Trump administration over Elon Musk’s weekend email demanding that they explain their accomplishments last week or be fired.

The demand by the world’s richest person is invalid because there were no rules or programs that require workers to provide such a report to the Office of Personnel Management, the unions said. They also contend that not all federal agencies were directing their workers to comply with the email.

“At least some federal agencies, including the Federal Bureau of Investigation, began telling their employees not to respond to this OPM surprise request,” unions for the employees said in an amended lawsuit filed in federal court in San Francisco Sunday.

The email, sent Saturday from an OPM address, demanded employees submit five bullet points explaining “what did you do last week” by the end of the day Monday. Musk had previewed the demand in a post on X, the social-media platform he controls.

In addition to the FBI, the Department of Homeland Security and the Department of Defense have told its workers not to respond to the email.

The unions are seeking a court order barring any action against employees who fail to respond to OPM’s instructions. The workers added the claims about the email to an earlier suit challenging government efforts to fire thousands of newer probationary workers.

Since President Donald Trump took office last month, Musk’s Department of Government Efficiency team has accessed sensitive Treasury Department data and organized a buyout program to push employees into “higher productivity” private-sector jobs, among other controversial moves.

White House Deputy Press Secretary Anna Kelly blasted the lawsuit in a statement.

“In the time it took these employees on taxpayer-funded salaries to file a frivolous lawsuit, they could have briefly recapped their accomplishments to their managers, as is common in the private sector, 100 times over,” Kelly said. “The Trump administration will continue to demand the high level of dedication and excellence from public employees that the American people deserve.”

OPM didn’t immediately respond to a message seeking comment.

Musk, the billionaire chief executive officer of Tesla Inc. and SpaceX, defended the move in a post on X early Monday, calling it a “check to see if the employee had a pulse and was capable of replying to an email.” A CNN poll from last week found that a slight majority of Americans — 54% — say it’s a bad thing that Trump gave Musk such a prominent role in his administration.

“This mess will get sorted out this week,” Musk said in the tweet. “Lot of people in for a rude awakening and strong dose of reality. They don’t get it yet, but they will.”

The case is American Federation of Government Employees v. US Office of Personnel Management, 25-cv-1780,US District Court (Northern District of California).

(Updates with comment from the White House.)

--With assistance from Zoe Tillman.

To contact the reporters on this story:
Anthony Aarons in New York at aaarons@bloomberg.net;
Erik Larson in New York at elarson4@bloomberg.net

To contact the editors responsible for this story:
Sara Forden at sforden@bloomberg.net

Elizabeth Wasserman, Steve Stroth

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