Musk says feds must explain what they did last week — or lose their jobs. That’s illegal: WaPo story

Federal workers began receiving emails Saturday asking them to describe what they did last week — as E-lon M-usk warned on social media that, if employees fail to respond, it will be taken as a resignation.

M-usk wrote he was acting “consistent with President u/realDonaldTr-ump’s instructions,” apparently referencing a social media post Tr-ump shared earlier Saturday encouraging the billionaire to be harsher in his efforts to slash the federal workforce.

Tr-ump posted on Saturday morning to Truth Social, his social media platform, commending M-usk for doing “A GREAT JOB,” but adding, “I WOULD LIKE TO SEE HIM GET MORE AGGRESSIVE.”

M-usk’s post to X came about seven hours later, and the emails began going out to federal employees close to 4:30 p.m.

“Please reply to this email with approx. 5 bullets of what you accomplished last week and cc your manager,” read the email, sent from the HR arm of the Office of Personnel Management, according to a copy reviewed by The Post. “Please do not send any classified information, links, or attachments.”The deadline to reply, the email stated, is Monday at 11:59 p.m. Eastern.

The posting comes after a difficult and chaotic two weeks for America’s 2.3-million federal employees, who saw tens of thousands of their probationary colleagues fired under a joint M-usk and Tr-ump bid to radically shrink the government, which is being spearheaded by M-usk’s U.S. D.O.G.E. Service.

Many federal employees spent the past several days tearfully bidding farewell to colleagues or facing intense strain as they wondered whether their jobs, too, might be on the chopping block.

If the government decides to treat employees who don’t respond to the email as having resigned, that would be illegal, said Nick Bednar, a professor of law at the University of Minnesota, noting that federal law states that government employees’ resignations must be voluntary.

Previous case law before the Merit Systems Protection Board — the board that hears appeals of disciplinary actions against federal workers — has established what counts as voluntary, and the situation laid out in M-usk’s post would not qualify, Bednar said.

If you are a federal employee affected by this email or any other aspect of D.O.G.E.’s work, please reach out. We want to tell your stories:

Hannah Natanson: [hannah.natanson@washpost.com](mailto:hannah.natanson@washpost.com) or (202) 580-5477 on Signal.

Faiz Siddiqui: [faiz.siddiqui@washpost.com](mailto:faiz.siddiqui@washpost.com) or 513-659-9944⁩ on Signal.

EDIT:
We would love to hear about what federal workers write back in response to this email — for a potential story capturing folks’ descriptions of the work they do and why it matters, as well as whatever other sorts of replies people choose to send. Please consider sharing whatever you write in reply with us!