The Department of Defense approved more than 20,000 applications from civilian employees in the deferred resignation program, according to a senior defense official. The tally amounts to roughly one-third of the total number of civilian employees the department wants to cut.
Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth ordered a 5%-8% reduction in the approximately 900,000 civilian workforce, which amounts to about 50,000-60,000 employees.
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The DOD is trying to reduce the workforce in three ways: through the voluntary employee resignation program, a hiring freeze, and firing some probationary employees, though the last effort is tied up in a legal battle.
“We are confident we could absorb those removals without a detriment to our ability to continue the mission. And so that’s how we can be confident that we don’t need to worry about any resulting impact on the uniform force,” the official told reporters on Tuesday, adding that the reduction is something “the secretary is confident can be done without negatively impacting readiness.”
The secretary issued a hiring freeze a couple of weeks ago. The department onboards about 70,000 civilian employees annually, so the freeze would reduce the number of new employees by about 6,000 monthly, the official added.
“As long as we maintain the hiring freeze, we’re gaining thousands towards the workforce reduction target each month just by instituting that,” the official explained.
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The department sought to fire roughly 5,400 probationary workers, but that is on hold due to court challenges.
The Pentagon’s desired reduction in workforce is a part of the Trump administration’s overall efforts to reduce the size of the federal government, which has been led by the newly created Department of Government Efficiency.