Elon Musk, head of the Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE), has issued an ultimatum to federal employees: document your work or resign. The directive, announced via a Saturday afternoon post on X, requires federal workers to provide a detailed account of their activities from the previous week, with a deadline of Monday at midnight.
“Consistent with President @realDonaldTrump’s instructions, all federal employees will shortly receive an email requesting to understand what they got done last week. Failure to respond will be taken as a resignation,” wrote Musk.
The Office of Personnel Management (OPM), which oversees federal employment, confirmed the directive in a statement. “As part of the Trump Administration’s commitment to an efficient and accountable federal workforce, OPM is asking employees to provide a brief summary of what they did last week by the end of Monday, CC’ing their manager,” the statement read. “Agencies will determine any next steps.”
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The directive is part of President Donald Trump’s broader effort to reduce the federal government’s size and cost.
Since taking office in January 2025, Trump has signed executive orders ending remote work options for federal employees and offering voluntary buyouts to thousands of workers. According to Trump, approximately 75,000 federal employees have accepted these “deferred resignations.”
Musk, the billionaire tech entrepreneur, was tapped by Trump to lead DOGE, a newly created department tasked with identifying and eliminating waste, fraud, and abuse across federal agencies. Since his appointment, Musk has implemented dramatic cuts to federal spending, including layoffs and the termination of probationary employees in several health agencies.
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Speaking at the Conservative Political Action Conference (CPAC) on Saturday, Trump praised Musk’s efforts. “DOGE is now waging war on government waste, fraud, and abuse, and Elon is doing a great job,” Trump said. “We want to make government smaller, more efficient. We want to keep the best people, and we’re not going to keep the worst people.”
The directive follows a series of high-profile cuts at the National Institutes of Health (NIH) last weekend, where DOGE has held marathon meetings to identify further reductions. Despite the layoffs of probationary employees and voluntary buyouts, NIH still employs more full-time staff than it did before the COVID-19 pandemic.
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