Trump to offer two million federal workers buyouts in accelerated government purge

Up to two million federal workers will be offered buyouts if they don't want to return to the office as part of Donald Trump's government purge, confirmed on Tuesday.

The Trump administration started sending emails to thousands of federal workers Tuesday evening offering them a chance to voluntarily vacate their government posts while remaining on the payroll for months.

The email was linked to President Donald Trump's executive order demanding federal employees return to the office. 

An email landed in federal workers' inboxes offering them a package and the ability to voluntarily separate from the federal government before DOGE starts identifying areas that could afford to be cut, sources told DailyMail.com.

A spokesperson for the Office of Personnel Management said the employees who accept the terms were being offered the chance to go on administrative leave through Sept. 30 at full pay. 

It comes as many federal employees eye leaving their jobs amid Donald Trump's takeover in Washington, D.C. – as the new Trump administration has fired top Justice Department officials who worked on his criminal prosecution and placed other senior administration members on paid leave.

The President ordered his agencies to create, implement and enforce return-to-office orders that would require the entire federal workforce to come back to the office full-time.

Others have been reassigned to direct their efforts against so-called sanctuary cities amid Trump's immigration crackdown. 

DOGE official Katie Miller confirmed the email was going to 2 million federal workers. 

Axios reported Thursday that the government offered to pay the workers who don't want to return to the office through Sept. 30, provided they resign by Feb. 6.  

The impact of Trump ordering federal employees back to the office is still not fully known. 

Some employees were already considering whether they would keep their jobs if they had to give up telework. Many have arrangements that require them to go into the office for a portion of the week.

Some no longer have physical spaces that are assigned to them under changes made since the pandemic.  

For years since the pandemic agency heads have cited difficulty retaining employees if they made a shift to in-office work. 

The White House Office of Personnel Management (OPM)'s new chief of staff, Amanda Scales, is a former employee of billionaire Elon Musk, the Donald Trump pal who now runs the new Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE).

DOGE has announced plans to slash government spending and eliminate large swaths of the federal workforce, claiming that the inflated number of employees contributes largely to the government's wasteful spending.

Another priority for DOGE is to force workers back to the office or else be terminated. Trump signed an executive order last week agencies are already implementing plans to get people back to the office.

Trump ordered agencies to get all full-time workers back to the office 'as soon as practicable,' while directing that remote work arrangements also end unless considered necessary.

'This is about fairness: it's not fair that most people have to come to work to build products or provide services while Federal Government employees get to stay home,' Musk posted on his X site. 

OPM sent out a 'federal government-wide email communication test' last week as a way to establish that it could communicate a single message to all government employees at the same time.

'OPM is testing a new capability allowing it to send important communications to ALL civilian federal employees from a single email address,' a Thursday statement on the incoming test read. 'Testing of this messaging system functionality is expected as soon as this week.'

Two federal employees filed suit against OPM claiming the new email distribution system constitutes a threat to privacy.

An anonymous post on Reddit claimed the government was being 'systematically dismantled' and claimed a career employee was pushed out for failing to set up such an email system and that a new server was set up inside the agency.