Workers were laid off last week at the agency responsible for overseeing the safety of automobile manufacturers — including Elon Musk’s Tesla — and at the agency for ensuring pipelines are safe, according to four people with knowledge of the personnel moves.
The layoffs, which seem to be targeting those with less than a year's tenure, come amid a government-wide effort undertaken by Musk and his cost-cutters, who have barnstormed across agencies looking to ditch spending and reduce the federal workforce.
Over the weekend, reports surfaced that hundreds of people, including technical staff who support air traffic control functions, had been let go at the Federal Aviation Administration. According to those interviewed, granted anonymity to discuss the matter candidly, layoffs also hit the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration, the Pipelines and Hazardous Materials Safety Administration, the Maritime Administration (MARAD) and DOT's office of the undersecretary.
“To my understanding it’s pretty indiscriminate across all modal agencies at the department,” one former DOT employee told POLITICO.
DOT did not return repeated requests for comment about or details on the layoffs.
Some of those layoffs at NHTSA appear to have started the evening of Feb. 14, according to a termination email viewed by POLITICO. The termination memo, from Jack Danielson, NHTSA’s executive director, cites guidance from the Office of Personnel Management and argues that their job isn't final until their probationary period is over, and that until then "a probationer has the burden to demonstrate why it is in the public interest for the Government to finalize their appointment to the civil service.”
It goes on to say that NHTSA finds that “based on your performance you have not demonstrated that your further employment at the Department of Transportation — NHTSA would be in the public interest.”
Ian O'Dowd, a traffic safety researcher who had been with NHTSA for less than a year and therefore was considered a probationary employee, is among those who were laid off. O'Dowd's work involved research related to impaired driving, including drunk driving and driving while under the influence of cannabis.
“Along with so many others in the federal service, I received an email Friday evening that said I was being removed from my role as a Research Psychologist at NHTSA with no notice or severance. I'm actively looking for new opportunities in social science research, ideally remote and/or based in the Twin Cities,” O’Dowd wrote in a LinkedIn post.
He added that the past few weeks “have been incredibly difficult mental health-wise” and encouraged his network on LinkedIn to check in on others in the federal government.
O'Dowd declined comment, referring back to his posting on LinkedIn.
At MARAD, the agency responsible for the country’s waterborne transportation system, many probationary employees have been laid off from jobs that don’t have an explicit national security nexus, said two former DOT employees granted anonymity because they were not authorized to speak to the media, said.
And at the office of the undersecretary, many of the probationary employees were purged, the people said. Probationary employees were also let go at PHMSA, according to a former employee there. That person added that all of the administrative assistants at PHMSA’s eight regional offices were also terminated.
In an X post late Monday, DOT Secretary Sean Duffy said that fewer than 400 FAA employees were let go as part of a probationary purge at the agency.
Sam Ogozalek contributed to this report.
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