Written by Rafael Sater
WASHINGTON (Reuters) – US President Donald Trump ordered federal employees to return to their offices five days a week and signed an executive order in front of cheering supporters in Washington, DC. Capital One (NYSE:)Arena on Monday.
The move will force large numbers of white-collar government employees to abandon remote working arrangements, reversing a trend set in motion in the early stages of the COVID-19 pandemic.
Some Trump allies have said the back-to-work mandate is intended to help shrink the civil service, making it easier for Trump to replace long-serving government employees with loyalists.
In a brief statement posted on the White House website, Trump ordered all department and agency heads “to take all necessary steps as soon as possible to end remote work arrangements and require employees to return to in-person duties.” On a full-time basis, with the heads of departments and agencies making the exceptions they deem necessary.”
The return-to-office order is coupled with a hiring freeze and the creation of an advisory body — dubbed the Government Efficiency Administration — that aims to help Trump divest large parts of the federal government and eliminate some agencies wholesale.
Experts say the overall effect of the changes will be to push disillusioned government employees out of their jobs, a goal the Trump team is clearly seeking to achieve.
Tesla (NASDAQ:) CEO Elon Musk — who heads the cost-cutting body — recently predicted that eliminating the “coronavirus-era privilege” of remote work would lead to “a wave of voluntary terminations that we welcome.”
