(Bloomberg) — Federal workers who scoffed when they first received Elon Musk’s infamous “Fork in the Road” buyout initiative are taking different tack now that there is a second offer on the table: saying yes.
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Staffers at several agencies — among them the Departments of Defense, Energy and Transportation — face deadlines this month to resign now and continue receiving pay through September.
“Fork 2,” as federal workers call it, presents remaining staff with a difficult decision. Many who resisted the first buyout — even amid threats of layoffs to come — wanted to stay on the job to defend the public service work many of them have done for decades.
Now that they’ve seen Musk’s Department of Government Efficiency roll through the federal bureaucracy, dismantling entire agencies and spurring mass layoffs at others, many are less convinced that the fight is worth it.
At least 2,700 workers at the Energy Department — which oversees the nation’s nuclear stockpile — applied for the buyout last week, more than double the 1,300 who left in the first wave of deferred resignations. About 4,000 workers — roughly 7% of the workforce — at the Department of Transportation have also asked to take the offer.
Roughly one-fifth of Internal Revenue Service staff — some 20,000 workers — are taking the buyout, a significant increase from the 4,700 employees who opted in for the first round.
The scope of departures from this round of buyouts isn’t yet certain. Unlike the first opportunity — when about 75,000 workers chose to leave their jobs — this wave is being handled on an agency-by-agency basis, rather than centrally at the Office of Personnel Management. Several agencies have still deadlines later this month to request buyouts.
A veteran safety official at the Interior Department said senior managers are much more inclined to take the second buyout offer than they were the first, even as some supervisors were trying to reassure staffers who remain that the agency’s operations won’t be completely shut down.
Workers now have firsthand experience that the threats of staff cuts — even those contested in ongoing court cases — are far from idle. And the prospect of competing for private sector jobs with other laid-off federal workers gives staffers a powerful incentive to leave sooner rather than later.
A representative for the Interior Department declined to comment. A spokesperson for the Office of Personnel Management said each agency is handling their own buyout process and that OPM is not tracking the total numbers of employees leaving.
More Cuts Ahead
Agencies are also in the process of implementing reduction-in-force plans, giving workers extra incentive to leave on their own terms. Employees who are “RIF’d” will receive only one week of severance per year of service, plus their health care will end immediately. Those who take the buyout keep their paychecks and medical coverage through the end of September.
This time around, too, federal workers have the benefit of hindsight. When the first Fork-in-the-Road offer arrived in January, many assumed it was a ploy. At the time, just days into the Trump administration, the government-wide email caught everyone by surprise. Democratic lawmakers, union representatives and labor lawyers urged staffers to be skeptical.
A 15-page FAQ circulated to federal workers earlier this month acknowledges that the first pass was flawed.
“Many employees expressed concerns about the validity of the program,” the document said. “This uncertainty may have prevented some employees from taking advantage of the program.”
But the second offer is coming not via Musk but from within the agencies themselves. Instead of a random email address from OPM, workers received contracts directly from their agencies. People also know now that their colleagues who accepted the first deferred resignation are — in fact — being paid.
Jobs within federal agencies are becoming less secure. The administration has begun notifying employees that they will lose their civil service protections, formerly known as Schedule F, which would make them fireable at will — albeit without going through the formal process required to make these changes.
There have been more than 280,000 planned cuts of federal workers and contractors across 27 agencies during the past two months, according to data earlier this month from outplacement firm Challenger, Gray & Christmas.
Many of those job cuts are facing legal challenges that are still winding their way through court, but Trump has racked up a series of wins that could further motivate workers to leave.
Agencies this week are also slated to submit reorganization plans, which could also include more waves of job cuts, worker relocations or other proposals that could make government jobs less attractive.
–With assistance from Ted Mann and Gregory Korte.
(Updates with IRS figures in the sixth paragraph)
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