WASHINGTON — The Social Security Administration sent termination notices to several dozen employees Thursday, the latest in a long string of mass federal agency layoffs since President Donald Trump returned to the White House.
The administration has targeted newly-hired employees in a yearlong “probationary” period at other federal agencies as part of the Department of Government Efficiency’s downsizing effort, led by billionaire Elon Musk. Probationary employees make up about 10% of federal workers across agencies.
The cuts at SSA may be the smallest undertaken so far by the Trump administration and a nod to Social Security’s relatively privileged position among federal programs.
A union representing 42,000 of Social Security’s roughly 60,000 employees said that out of 1,800 probationary employees at the SSA, only 41 received termination notices on Thursday.
Rich Couture, spokesman for the AFGE Social Security General Committee, said in a statement that the union was “grateful” almost all the employees were spared.
Frontline Social Security employees include workers who answer phone calls from the public and who staff field offices around the country. Lawmakers have criticized the agency for long call wait times in recent years, as the U.S. population ages and more Americans become eligible for retirement benefits.
“With 10,000 new beneficiaries each day, and a 50-year low in staffing, now is the time to be adding to our frontline staff,” Couture said.
The Social Security Administration said probationary employees meeting performance expectations in customer service positions, as well as workers who track fraud and do cybersecurity work, were exempted from layoffs. The agency also exempted military service veterans.
As for the 41 probationary employees who received termination notices, they were given the option to transfer to a frontline position.
“Employees who accept this option will receive the training they need to serve in an appropriate frontline customer service position that helps the agency continue to deliver on its mission: to pay the right person the right amount at the right time and provide other critical services,” a Social Security spokesperson said.
Nancy Altman, president of Social Security Works, a liberal group that opposes benefit cuts, said the 41 workers who received termination notices were likely attorneys at Social Security’s headquarters in Baltimore. Offering them frontline positions in other locations, Altman said, is “basically forcing them to quit rather than outright firing them.”
The SSA administers one of the government’s most popular federal programs: retirement benefits for more than 50 million older Americans. Trump has distinguished himself from the rest of the Republican Party in part by vowing never to touch Social Security benefits.
This week, however, Trump and Musk have falsely claimed SSA sends retirement benefits to millions of people who are more than 100 years old — in other words, to many people who are not alive — in an effort to portray Social Security as full of fraud. The Washington Post reported Monday that the SSA’s acting director resigned over the weekend after DOGE staffers demanded access to sensitive data.
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Altman said she believed there were at least four DOGE staffers embedded at Social Security’s main office and that “they definitely have access to all the private information stored there.”
Democrats on the House Ways and Means Committee, which oversees Social Security, blasted early reports of possible layoffs in statements on social media.
“The public servants at SSA all work in service to our Social Security beneficiaries so when the billionaires cut them, it’s your benefits at risk,” the Ways and Means Democrats said.