Originally published House committee’s top Democrat presses for details on HHS layoffs on by https://federalnewsnetwork.com/workforce/2025/08/house-committees-top-democrat-presses-for-details-on-hhs-layoffs/ at Federal News Network
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The top Democrat on the House Education and Workforce Committee is renewing his call for details about the reductions in force that have taken place at the Department of Health and Human Services.
In a letter sent to HHS on Monday, Rep. Bobby Scott (D-Va.), the committee’s ranking member, pressed HHS Secretary Robert F. Kennedy, Jr., to explain how the layoffs of thousands of federal employees this year are impacting the agency’s mission.
“As a result of these actions, operations of vital programs are in jeopardy — threatening to deprive individuals and families in the most vulnerable communities of invaluable services,” Scott wrote in the letter.
Scott also pressed for answers on the decision-making process at HHS as the layoffs took place earlier this year. He argued that HHS had not provided enough information to Congress as the downsizing occurred across the agency’s workforce. The letter on Monday was Scott’s second message to Kennedy requesting more information.
“I have yet to receive a response to my initial letter, and meanwhile, HHS is continuing its efforts to hollow out the department and undermine its core functions,” Scott wrote.
HHS did not immediately respond to Federal News Network’s request for comment on Scott’s letter.
Earlier this year, HHS moved forward with multiple RIFs, while thousands more federal employees left their jobs voluntarily and through attrition. On April 1, HHS sent RIF notices to about 10,000 employees. Another 10,000 employees left by accepting separation incentives, such as the deferred resignation program. Altogether, the department has reduced its staffing levels by about 25% this year.
Compared governmentwide, HHS has some of the highest numbers in workforce reductions. The agency comes behind only the departments of Treasury, Agriculture and Defense, according to data compiled by the Partnership for Public Service.
HHS first outlined its plans for agency cuts in March, saying that it would reduce its 28 divisions down to 15, while also consolidating its number of regional offices from 10 to five. The Food and Drug Administration, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, and the National Institutes of Health all planned for employee reductions reaching into the thousands. HHS, at the time, also described plans to fully eliminate the Administration for Community Living and spread the ACL’s programs across three remaining agency divisions.
“We aren’t just reducing bureaucratic sprawl. We are realigning the organization with its core mission and our new priorities in reversing the chronic disease epidemic,” Kennedy said earlier this year in a March 27 press release.
In the months that followed, however, some of the HHS layoffs were reversed. In June, the CDC walked back the layoffs of 800 employees out of the 2,400 it had terminated in a RIF. And in May, both NIH and the National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health similarly reinstated a portion of the employees the agencies had terminated in March.
Then more broadly, a federal judge ruled in July that the mass layoffs at HHS were likely unlawful, and ordered the Trump administration to halt its plans to downsize and restructure the department. The preliminary injunction blocked the Trump administration from finalizing a portion of the layoffs it first announced in March, and from issuing further firings.
“The executive branch does not have the authority to order, organize, or implement wholesale changes to the structure and function of the agencies created by Congress,” U.S. District Judge Melissa DuBose wrote in the July 1 court document that granted a preliminary injunction on the HHS layoffs.
But in his letter this week, Scott raised concerns that HHS was continuing with broader downsizing efforts, outside the scope of that preliminary injunction.
“Given that HHS has once again pursued RIFs, I seek clarity on all the positions and divisions that have been affected to date and assurance that the department is complying with the court order,” Scott wrote.
Just one week after DuBose’s preliminary injunction, the Supreme Court on July 8 ruled that the Trump administration’s efforts to reduce the federal workforce could move forward, although some court cases surrounding the RIFs remain ongoing.
After the Supreme Court’s ruling, on July 14, HHS then proceeded with finalizing RIFs and officially terminating thousands of agency positions.
HHS previously told Federal News Network that all employees who received RIF notices have been officially separated from the agency — aside from the narrow group of employees covered by the preliminary injunction issued by DuBose, and those who have been reinstated in recent months at the NIH, CDC and other components.
But through his letter this week, Scott is seeking more transparency. The lawmaker requested a detailed spreadsheet from HHS on the agency’s terminations earlier this year. He also called for more information on how many employees were removed from their jobs, the divisions they worked in, their job titles and where they fell on the General Schedule. He asked Kennedy to respond to the inquiry by Aug. 18.
“The department is undertaking these efforts without providing comprehensive information to Congress about its activities to downsize the department,” Scott wrote, “While also failing to respond to specific requests for information from members of Congress.”
The Associated Press contributed to this report.
If you would like to contact this reporter about recent changes in the federal government, please email [email protected] or reach out on Signal at drewfriedman.11
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Originally published House committee’s top Democrat presses for details on HHS layoffs on by https://federalnewsnetwork.com/workforce/2025/08/house-committees-top-democrat-presses-for-details-on-hhs-layoffs/ at Federal News Network
Originally published Federal News Network
