Government agency to review health and safety effects of Trump's mass firings [View all]
Source: USA Today
Published 5:15 a.m. ET March 24,2 025
WASHINGTON — An independent government watchdog agency will probe how President Donald Trump's mass firings of early-tenure employees affect on air travel, the spread of diseases, nuclear safety, food safety, veterans health care, the opioid epidemic, and the ability to respond to floods and wildfires.
The Government Accountability Office, a nonpartisan watchdog agency that investigates, audits, and evaluates government operations for Congress, said it would open the investigation in response to a March 6 request from a group of 11 Democrats, led by Sen. Elizabeth Warren.
States, workers, unions, nonprofits, and an independent watchdog have all brought legal challenges to the Trump administration's firings of tens of thousands of federal employees in their probationary periods, and federal judges have reinstated many. But little information is available about the downstream effects of having fewer workers.
"Rather than make government more efficient, these firings appear to have created massive inefficiencies and put the American people at risk," the Democratic senators wrote. They called the Trump administration’s approach "indiscriminate" and pointed to their attempts to rehire nuclear safety and food safety workers after the firings.
Read more: https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/politics/2025/03/24/donald-trump-mass-firings-government-accountability-office-review/82598395007/
Link to original GAO investigation request PRESS RELEASE - Warren, Senators Call for Investigation into Trump’s Purge of Workers Protecting Americans’ Health and Safety
Link to request LETTER (PDF) - https://www.warren.senate.gov/imo/media/doc/letter_from_senator_warren_to_gao_re_health__safety.pdf
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