Doge’s staff had questions about ‘resignation’ email. His new human resources leader dodged them

On Friday, the staff of what was previously the digital service of the United States and now is part of the Elon Musk Doge initiative met with Stephanie Holmes, who identified himself as part of the Dogs team and as the new resource representative staff humans.

Throughout the meeting, which began at noon ET, dozens of USDS employees released questions in holmes related to last week “Make fork on the way” Email that offers federal workers “Deferred Resignation”, according to the documents detailing the meeting obtained by the assistance of Wired and CorroboColated for the sources it presents. The questions covered issues ranging from the future of personnel projects to whether the mandates back to the office would apply to fully remote workers, as well as to the exact nature of the offer that the federal government was making employees.

Holmes, who did not respond immediately to a comment request, could completely answer only some of the questions. She said, when asked, that the offer was “legal”, and then said: “We believe that the offer is legal” and could provide little additional guidance beyond that. At one point, he was asked if there would be a more formal way to accept the purchase than to respond to an email with the word “resign” in the matter of matter. An employee expressed concern that external actors could send electronic resignation emails on behalf of the staff by falsifying their email addresses.

“I guess, if people decide to go with the deferred resignation, there is some kind of real agreement that we sign,” said an employee. “Can we get a copy of that in advance to get a preview? Can we obtain a copy of the agreement if there is an agreement?

“I don’t know,” Holmes replied. “But I will turn on that.”

The confusion occurs when the deadline of February 6 is coming so that federal workers accept the agreement. In the email, which was very similar to a musk sent to Twitter employees in 2022, the sender, identified as the Personnel Management Office (OPM), suggests that workers who choose not to give up could yet lose their jobs Later. Holmes were asked if he could commit to a specific moment to provide the workforce of Dogle additional details on deferred resignation agreements.

No, “said Holmes. “You know, I think that the information you will have about this is available for you at this time, and again, you will only have to make a personal decision based on the information available for you at this time.”

The same employee responded, saying: “I apologize for interjection, but there are a variety of things that this room has mentioned that they are contradictory or difficult to understand … I wonder why you cannot commit to provide those details right now.”

“Yes, I appreciate your question and I do not want to be repetitive or seem argumentative in any way, but again, I would only encourage you to not lose sight of the overview here,” says Holmes. “The benefits of accepting the deferred resignation is that it will be guaranteed that it is not subject to the reduction of force and is exempt from the mandate back to the office. So I would recommend that you focus on the generous aspects of the offer. “

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On his first day in office, President Donald Trump signed an executive order established by the Government’s efficiency department, or Doge, reorganizing the digital services of the United States, an existing entity located within the president’s executive office, such as The Doge Service of the United States. Trump appointed Elon Musk as head of Doge, who would do a long time to reduce spending among government agencies. From the publication, Doge faces at least three demands Challenging his designation as a federal agency.

While Musk has installed lieutenants at his higher levels and is now using it as a lever to exercise control over the federal government, before the recent executive order, the US digital service was a relatively small agency with about 200 employees. His mandate was to help disregard dysfunctional technology throughout the government, at the service of which he had the ability to enter government agencies and access their technical and software systems.