In a recent video statement, Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth has instructed civilian employees of the Department of Defense (DOD) to respond to an email from the Office of Personnel Management (OPM), detailing five achievements from the previous week.
fHegseth stated that the responses would contribute to efforts to streamline the civilian workforce. Earlier this month, he announced the initial reduction of 5,400 probationary civilian employees from a total of approximately 50,000 probationary employees and around 250,000 civilian workers.
According to Breitbart, Hegseth explained in his statement, On February 22 of this year, OPM sent an email to all federal civilians asking them to provide, you remember this, approximately five bullets of what they did last week, describing their accomplishments. Well, the Department of Defense employees received direction to, at first, just initially pause responding to this request to OPM because we do, we work on topics of national security, of sensitivity, of classification, we needed to be careful on that front. He further directed each member of the departments civilian workforce to provide those five points on their accomplishments from the previous week.
Hegseth's directive is seen as a "pulse check," a term also used by Elon Musk, who heads the Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) and was responsible for the initial email. President Donald Trump, in a Cabinet meeting last week, also referred to it as a measure to verify if employees were attending work and still serving the government. A lot of people are not answering because they dont even exist, he noted.
In his video, Hegseth elaborated, Its a simple task, really, as Elon said, as the President recognized in our first Cabinet meeting, just to pulse check, Are you there? out to DOD civilians now. He further explained that all DOD civilians would receive an email outlining the next steps to comply with this initiative, and the reports would then be consolidated within the department to adhere to the OPM directive.
Hegseth acknowledged the contributions of the DOD workforce in his statement, but also emphasized its size. Weve got a lot of civilian patriots who dedicate themselves to defending this nation while working here at the Department of Defense. And a lot of them, many of them, most of them, are critical to our national security. And as we work to restore focus on DODs, core war fighting mission under President Trumps leadership, we recognize that we cannot accomplish that mission without the strong and important contributions of our civilian workforce, but its a really big workforce as well, which we recognize now, Hegseth stated.
Elon Musk expressed his appreciation to Hegseth on social media, posting, Much appreciated @SecDef Hegseth! This move by the Defense Secretary is seen as a step towards ensuring efficiency and accountability within the Department of Defense, aligning with conservative values of limited government and individual responsibility.
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