Photo: Raed Mansour
The Trump administration has launched a significant workforce reduction, targeting over 200,000 probationary federal employees across multiple agencies, including a staggering purge at the National Institutes of Health (NIH) and Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC),
The day of reckoning at NIH in Bethesda, Maryland, saw scientists and medical researchers walking out in disbelief, some in tears, some walking arm-in-arm, as they were forced to clear out their offices, according to NBC Washington.
It is unclear how many employees were terminated in the Friday purge, but according to Katie Sandlin, an Education Outreach Specialist at the National Human Genome Research Institute (NHGRI), the number was 2,000.
“Today, along with 2,000 other NIH employees, I had to clear out my office,” said Katie Sandlin, an Education Outreach Specialist at the National Human Genome Research Institute (NHGRI).
“It was truly the honor of my life to work with such incredibly passionate people focused on improving human health,” she added.
Today, along with 2,000 other NIH employees, I had to clear out my office
It was truly the honor of my life to work with such incredibly passionate people focused on improving human health. pic.twitter.com/s50eyQnEw8
— Katie Sandlin (@KatieMSandlin) February 14, 2025
Angela Dice Ciao expressed her frustration in a Facebook post after her husband was terminated.
“I don’t normally post, but I need to. Thanks to NIH cuts and Pitt now cutting costs, my husband is out of a job. Just like that, after 16 years of giving his life to research and being underpaid for it most of the time…. One month notice. Just like that! If anyone knows of a university or company that is hiring locally in Pittsburgh, given the new NIH executive order and cuts, who knows, but he is PhD in molecular biology, and his skills are in: cloning, vector design, molecular recombination, evolution and molecular genetics and gene therapy,” she wrote.
The NIH wasn’t the only agency affected.
At the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), nearly 1,300 probationary employees—amounting to roughly 10% of its workforce—were given their walking papers.
However, according to Stat News, approximately 5,200 employees across agencies under the Department of Health and Human Services, including the National Institutes of Health and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, have been terminated.
The news outlet reported:
Senior officials were informed in meetings Friday morning that roughly 5,200 people on probationary employment — recent hires — across agencies including the National Institutes of Health and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention will be fired that afternoon, according to sources briefed on the meetings. CDC leadership was told the Atlanta-based agency would lose about 1,300 workers. The numbers at the NIH are not clear, but exceptions are being made for certain probationary employees, according to a memo viewed by STAT.
The workers will be given a month’s paid leave but lose access to work systems by the end of Friday, according to sources.
In addition to the probationary workers, an unspecified number of contract workers at the CDC and other Health and Human Services agencies have been informed over the course of the past week that their jobs had been terminated, including dozens at the Vaccine Research Center housed at NIH. Many jobs at these agencies are done by contract workers.
Other changes are expected, particularly at the leadership levels of organizations. When Susan Monarez, a former ARPA-H official, was named acting director of the CDC, she informed staff she would transition into the role of acting principal deputy director once Dave Weldon, the nominee to lead the agency, is confirmed. That move signaled that the current acting principal deputy director, Nirav Shah, who joined the CDC in March 2023, was likely out of a job. Earlier this week, Shah told CDC staff that his last day at the agency would be Feb. 28, a source told STAT.
Head of ARPA-H and Biden appointee Renee Wegrzyn told staff Friday morning that she was fired, a source told STAT. The agency, established in 2022 by Biden to work with the private sector on breakthrough medical technology, employs less than 200 workers. Because of the agency’s newness, most employees are considered probationary and could be targeted for layoffs.
The Department of Energy also witnessed significant cuts, with reports suggesting between 1,200 and 2,000 workers were dismissed, including hundreds from the office overseeing the nation’s nuclear stockpile.
The U.S. Forest Service terminated approximately 3,400 probationary employees, signaling a major shift in federal land and environmental policies under the Trump administration.
Meanwhile, the Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) announced it had dismissed over 1,000 employees, citing an annual savings of over $98 million as a justification for the cuts.
According to ABC News, sources familiar with the matter indicate that as many as 15,000 IRS workers have been identified for potential termination as early as next week.
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