(Credit: Tom Brenner/The Washington Post via Getty Images)
After signing an executive order demanding all federal employees return to in-person work last week, President Trump has now given them an ultimatum: obey or quit. It's an unusual proposal, but those in the tech space immediately noticed that it has Elon Musk's fingerprints all over it.
Trump’s deferred resignation program allows federal workers to quit before Feb. 6 and get paid until Sept. 30. If they stay, they must adapt to updated performance standards. They might also be subject to layoffs aimed at cutting federal expenses.
Though the email was sent by the Office of Personnel Management (OPM), the language is similar to what Musk, now the head of the Trump admin's unofficial Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE), wrote in a memo to Twitter employees when he acquired the company.
Musk's 2022 memo and the OPM email are both titled "Fork in the Road." Both documents also demand higher performance standards. In 2022, Musk said employees would "need to be extremely hardcore" to remain at Twitter. The OPM memo says federal "employees will be subject to enhanced standards of suitability and conduct as we move forward."
Both letters required employees to make immediate decisions on their future; the OPM provided one week, while Musk gave just one day. OPM is telling people to email with "resign" in the subject line if they want to leave; Musk told people to click "yes" on a Google form to resign.
Meanwhile, the last sentences of the OPM email and Musk memo are basically identical: "Whichever path you choose, we thank you for your service to The United States of America," OPM says. "Whatever decision you make, thank you for your efforts to make Twitter successful," the Twitter memo said.
The OPM memo was met with confusion among those who received it. Those who resign "will retain all pay and benefits regardless of your daily workload and will be exempted from all applicable in-person work requirements until September 30, 2025," it says. That suggested people still had to sign on and work, but in an FAQ, OPM said: "Except in rare cases determined by your agency, you are not expected to work."
On X, Musk insisted that OPM is offering "a fair & generous deal." However, a Reddit thread of those who say they received the OPM email is full of people annoyed by the tone of the missive.
"I was chill and laid back prior. Now I’m digging my heels in out of spite. I’m a big time hater and being petty is my favorite thing to do," one remarked.
"I love my job. I love my agency’s mission, and I am passionate about what we do. I really fucking care, and everybody I have ever met at my job really fucking cares. And I am genuinely so insulted and infuriated that a bunch of self-serving, nepobaby freaks with zero interest in serving their country are abusing the system like this," added another.
Earlier, Musk re-tweeted a post about federal civil service workers spending "most of their workdays complaining about their jobs on Reddit." But Musk himself has tweeted almost 50 times today alone.
Democrats are urging employees not to accept the deal. "There's no budget line item to pay people not showing up for work," Sen. Tim Kaine, a Virginia Democrat, said on the Senate floor. "Don't be fooled. [Trump] has tricked hundreds of people with that offer. If you accept that offer and resign, he'll stiff you just like he stiffed...contractors" in his real estate days, Kaine said.
The same might go for Musk, who faced several lawsuits from ex-Twitter employees who said they were not given the severance they were due. Musk prevailed in at least one of those cases, but lost in another.