You’ve probably seen that Russ Vought went on Twitter today and said “the RIFS [government speak for permanent layoffs] have begun.” Obviously, I can’t know directly what this means or what they’re doing. But since I’ve written about this a few times, I thought I should share my reaction. I remain skeptical that this is actually happening in a substantial way.
It could totally be happening. But I think the driver here is that Trump was getting hit increasingly hard for having flinched on this threat. And as of yesterday, they started backing off on the threat not to pay backpay to federal workers. So I think the press about this was getting to the White House and both angering Trump and making them look like they’re flailing. I would say I’m certain that this is why they’re doing this (reaction to that bad press). The only question is whether they’re actually going to follow through to really undo that impression.
I’ll note that there are no numbers attached to this announcement. And from what I can tell the Departments that have been listed as targets aren’t answering press queries about it. All I can say is that I would wait to see actual details before we have much certainty that there’s been some real shift. They have a lot more political need for this now, based on how the last ten days have gone. But the underlying calculus — they’re already rehiring people because they’re having a hard time maintaining basic government functions that affect “their” people — remains the same.
