‘It’s a way of life’: As layoffs spread, federal workers remain dedicated to serving the public

More than 30,000 federal employees have been fired in the first two months of President Donald Trump’s administration, and thousands more are on the chopping block as DOGE continues shrinking the workforce in the name of eliminating “waste, bloat, and insularity.”

These jobs are about more than just a paycheck and a pension, federal workers say. They’re about serving the public: helping low-income residents afford groceries, delivering mail to every household, working with fishing communities to develop more sustainable practices.

And these workers are not going quietly.

Some are joining unions or getting active in their local chapters. Others are working harder than ever, trying to provide services before layoffs slow systems or funding is slashed. Despite a commonly held belief that the chaos is meant to drive them away, many are refusing to quit — “working as a form of resistance,” as Mei at the USDA put it.

This story is based on Globe interviews with 10 federal employees, several of whom asked to be anonymous or to be identified by their first or middle names to protect their job security.

The Trump administration has said it is trying to make the federal workforce more efficient and effective; it did not respond to a request for comment.

Since the downsizing began last month, thousands of fired workers have been reinstated, and multiple lawsuits have been filed arguing the Trump administration’s actions are illegal. But the cuts continue.

In Massachusetts, where 46,000 people are federal employees, workers have held two rallies as part of the Federal Unionists Network, a cross-agency coalition that started informally advocating for pro-worker policies during the Biden administration and has expanded rapidly in recent months. On Friday evening, frustration and anger boiled over as more than 200 people marched to Boston Common blaring trumpets and carrying a large banner reading “Stop the Billionaire Coup.”

Ariel Shepetovskiy of Malden held back tears as she recounted her own firing from the Department of Education’s Office for Civil Rights less than 72 hours before the rally, when half the agency’s national workforce was let go. Her government-issued laptop suddenly shut down, and when it rebooted she saw a message that her job as a civil rights attorney had been terminated and the office she reported to in Cleveland had been shuttered.

“All I know now is that kids are going to suffer,” said Shepetovskiy, who investigated allegations of discrimination, including students with disabilities being bullied in school.

Federal unions have had a surge of interest since Trump was elected. The American Federation of Government Employees gained more than 16,000 new members in the first six weeks of the year, more than double the number who signed up in all of 2024, according to the Federal News Network.

Tyler, a mail carrier on the North Shore, recently became active with his union to fight for a job he loves and services he’s determined to keep accessible.

“To me it’s an honor to be able to do this,” he said. “I get to know people by name. I get to know people’s dogs.”

Despite the Trump administration’s claims of workforce bloat, the number of federal employees relative to the population has shrunk considerably over the years, while the responsibilities of the government have increased. There are 2.4 million federal employees, roughly the same number there were in 1969, despite the fact that the US population has increased by nearly 140 million since then. (This employee estimate doesn’t include Postal Service workers, active duty military personnel, or millions of federal contractors).

There appears to be little strategy behind the cuts other than firing the employees who were recently hired, said Max Stier, founding president of the Partnership for Public Service, a Washington nonprofit focused on improving government. The chaos is “terrorizing the existing workforce” and destroying morale, he said, which could lead to the loss of valuable employees — current and potential — and cost the government more money than it’s saving.

“At every level, they’re raining destruction down rather than efficiency,” he said, noting that the cuts will inhibit the government’s ability to operate. “I’m not putting gasoline in my gas tank so I just saved 30 bucks, but guess what? My car doesn’t run.”

It’s not just mass layoffs slamming the federal workforce, employees say, it’s insults and threats, too. After the Office of Personnel Management sent out an email demanding federal employees document five things they had accomplished in the past week, President Trump posted a Spongebob meme showing a checklist of five accomplishments, including “Cried about Trump and Elon,” and “Made it into the office for once.”

The administration’s actions are aiming to create “weaponized insecurity,” some employees say, pointing to a 2023 speech by Russell Vought, one of the architects of the conservative Project 2025 agenda, who is now head of the Office of Management and Budget. “We want the bureaucrats to be traumatically affected,” Vought said, when he was president of the conservative Center for Renewing America nonprofit. “We want them to not want to go to work because they are increasingly viewed as the villains.”

DOGE head Elon Musk last week shared and then quickly deleted a post by an X user that said, “Stalin, Hitler and Mao didn’t murder millions of people. Their public sector workers did.”

But convincing federal employees to leave on their own may not be that easy; many say say they are devoted to their missions. A recent survey found that 92 percent of federal workers agreed with the statement, “It is important to me that my work contribute to the common good.”

“These are the programs that governments are supposed to take on: the programs where you’re helping people to better the nation but you’re never going to turn a profit,” said Chris Eddington, 48, an employee at the USDA in Boston who works on electronic benefits transfer programs such as SNAP, formerly called food stamps.

At the National Marine Fisheries Service office in Gloucester, “everyone’s still working their asses off,” said Nicole, 35. Fishing regulations are updated constantly, especially as the climate changes, she said. And with groundfish season set to open May 1 — which is in question due to staffing cuts — workers are scrambling to make sure fishermen have up-to-date information.

“All of us are worried about our economic security and our futures, but that’s not what’s really being talked about,” she said, noting that people were in tears at a recent meeting. “It’s what’s going to happen to the resource, what’s going to happen to the fishermen, what’s going to happen to these communities?”

After the first “What did you do last week?” email went out, a social worker at a VA clinic in western Massachusetts read the message while he was working on a Sunday evening.

And he was incensed.

“It wasn’t what I had done over the week, it’s what I didn’t do,” said the social worker, who is a combat veteran. “I wasn’t able to put my son to bed because I was working overtime to make sure that veterans were getting taken care of… I haven’t searched for a more lucrative job.”

He was exhausted, working unpaid on the weekend — and totally committed.

“It’s not just a job,” he said. “It’s a way of life for me.”

This story was produced by the Globe’s Money, Power, Inequality team, which covers the racial wealth gap in Greater Boston. You can sign up for the newsletter here.

Katie Johnston can be reached at katie.johnston@globe.com. Follow her @ktkjohnston. Chris Serres can be reached at chris.serres@globe.com. Follow him @ChrisSerres.