It’s just being reported this morning that HHS has already fired thousands of federal workers across multiple health agencies this weekend.

The ones fired were the ‘probationary’ employees who are easier to terminate as they have less than a year on the job.

Here’s more from CBS News:

Probationary workers across multiple federal health agencies in the Department of Health and Human Services received virtually identical letters Saturday evening informing them they would be terminated from their positions, sources told CBS News.

“Unfortunately, the Agency finds that you are not fit for continued employment because your ability, knowledge and skills do not fit the Agency’s current needs, and your performance has not been adequate to justify further employment at the Agency,” read the letter obtained by CBS News.

The letter was signed by Jeffrey Anoka, acting head of human resources for the Department of Health and Human Services. One health official told CBS News thousands of letters were sent out Saturday.

Probationary workers are those that generally have less than a year on the job and are easier to fire than other federal staff.

The move comes amid a government-wide effort to cut probationary workers by the Department of Government Efficiency task force, or DOGE, led by billionaire Elon Musk.

More than 5,000 probationary workers at health agencies had initially been slated to be let go, though not all received letters of termination Saturday. Some letters were also sent in error to people not intended to be let go, officials said.

A White House official said Saturday that workers exempted from the cuts included scientists at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and the FDA, workers for Medicare and frontline healthcare providers.

“This isn’t a haphazard effort of us axing whoever we can ‘get away’ with axing for the sake of it. This is a calculated effort to streamline bureaucracy,” said the official.

Calley Means, an adviser for newly sworn-in Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr., defended the firings for reasons beyond cost savings, reiterating a criticism made during President Trump’s presidential campaign that officials had not done enough to address drivers of sliding life expectancy in the U.S.

“It would be irrational not to make changes,” Means wrote in a post to X.