It has been three weeks since courts ordered the Trump administration to reinstate thousands of probationary workers it terminated in a flurry of mass cuts across the federal government. Many of the workers — already off-boarded, locked out of their offices and disconnected from emails when the rulings came down — have yet to return to their jobs.
While they wait to learn their fate, many probationary employees appear to have been left in the dark, with some saying they face daily uncertainty made worse by limited and confusing communications about their benefits and positions. Others have found new employment and are moving on from the civil service, after career whiplash under Elon Musk‘s Department of Government Efficiency.
“I’m hoping I get my job back, but it doesn’t seem that way,” said one probationary worker who was fired from the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services and rehired because of a court mandate.
The employee, who asked not to be named while his job status remained in flux, said he worries for his future and his family’s financial stability, as lawsuits that could decide his long-term employment continue to unfold. Originally dismissed in February while approaching the halfway point of a two-year work probation, he received his termination letter on the same day he was scheduled to start paid parental leave for the birth of his second child.
About six weeks after receiving that letter, he was on administrative leave with pay and benefits. Justice Department lawyers have said that administrative leave placement is “a first part of a series of steps to reinstate probationary employees” and an “intermediate measure taken by a number of the agencies in order to return probationary employees to full duty status.”
But the employee said much of his time recently has been spent trawling the Internet for clues as to what may be coming next for probationary workers in his division, and job searching in case he needs to find another position.
He said sparse and inconsistent messaging about the terms of his leave, and whether he’s being kept on just to be fired again has exacerbated the stress of the situation and distracted from time he felt should have centered on family. The Department of Health and Human Services, the parent agency of the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services, is expected to lose nearly a quarter of its staff altogether, including cuts through a so-called “Reduction in Force” — a massive restructuring process making job losses permanent.
“We’re supposed to be OK. But one minute we’re in a good space, and the next minute we could just lose everything,” he told CBS News. “It’s definitely taking effect on my entire life right now.”
Another probationary worker who asked to remain anonymous and was fired in February from the Department of Education received an email on March 17 with the subject line “Reinstatement Notice,” which placed the individual on administrative leave but warned a second termination was imminent in oncoming layoffs.
“I think it’s important to point out the lack of cost effectiveness and the inefficiency of this,” said Sheria Smith, a former Education Department attorney. Smith was fired in March and has continued to serve as president of her local branch of the American Federation of Government Workers union, which sued the Trump administration over probationary firings.
“Now these employees, because they were illegally terminated, they are not able to work for the American public, but the American public still needs to pay them, and it is because of the incompetence of this administration,” she said.
At least 24,000 probationary employees were dismissed from 18 federal agencies in February as part of President Trump’s sweeping budget reduction initiative. Everyone targeted in probationary firings was reinstated about a month later, technically, in accordance with two related court rulings in California and Maryland that questioned the legality of their dismissals. But, for probationary workers at all but six agencies covered in the California case, the rehiring requirements were temporary — and they expired on Tuesday night.
In an updated filing on Tuesday, however, a judge in Maryland extended part of his earlier order, which effectively protects some probationary workers from being terminated while the case plays out. The protections, though, only apply to those who work or live in 19 states and Washington, D.C., narrowing the order’s scope, as it had previously applied to probationary workers nationally.
Andy Hazelton, a hurricane modeling specialist at the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration’s National Hurricane Center in Miami, said he was waiting to see how Florida-based probationary workers would fare going forward, since Florida was not included in the latest court order. He told CBS News about two weeks after being put on administrative leave, as part of rehiring, that he’d received his first paycheck on time, with back pay. But he said that others reinstated at NOAA had not. Hazelton said communication with his agency had been thin, and he still wasn’t sure where his health benefits stood.
A spokesperson for NOAA told CBS News: “Per long-standing practice, we are not discussing internal personnel and management matters. NOAA remains dedicated to its mission, providing timely information, research, and resources that serve the American public and ensure our nation’s environmental and economic resilience. Thanks for your understanding.”
Relegated to paid but strictly “non-duty” statuses in their departments, some probationary workers say they are learning more about their employment status from online forums like Reddit than through formal government channels, as their managers at times don’t know any more than they do, multiple people affected by the firings told CBS News.
Reinstated employees describe email communications with nameless federal officials that have largely been impersonal and sporadic. CBS News has reviewed emails from unfamiliar addresses like “ProbationaryNotice” that have offered compensation or benefits updates. Many have contained typos, conflicting instructions or caveats emphasizing that the employees may quickly be fired again if the courts’ legal actions don’t hold up.
Several workers said they have received emails from either “ProbationaryNotice” or their human resources departments demanding “resignations” after their reinstatements. One probationary worker, a military veteran fired from the Department of Agriculture, told CBS News the agency pressured him to resign from his role after he was reinstated, and insisted he pay a portion of his recruitment bonus back to the government, prorated to the resignation date, the worker said.
Michelle Huntoon, an attorney at the Department of Housing and Urban Development’s regional Boston office, considered her work on affordable housing projects “very impactful” and told CBS News she loved doing it. But she chose to accept a private-sector position after her initial firing, four months before the end of her two-year probation, and isn’t looking back.
“I don’t trust any of the people running this,” she said.
When HUD informed probationary workers of their reinstatements, the agency, in email correspondence reviewed by CBS News, told them they would not receive back pay or health insurance coverage while on administrative leave.
Huntoon said she had enrolled in her new company’s health care plan when she took the private-sector job, so the HUD policy didn’t hit her as hard as one of her colleagues, a Texas-based probationary worker who recently met Huntoon on social media while both tried to piece together what was going on.
The Texas worker, who asked not to be named over concern about the uncertainty of the situation, told CBS News the full premium for continuation of health coverage was $1,300 each month for a single person, along with a 2% administrative fee and additional out-of-pocket costs.
She said she could not afford it. Then, in a perplexing FAQ-style email to reinstated probationary staff this week, HUD said it was “in the process of submitting enrollment for reinstatements to health insurance carriers, with an estimate timeframe of EOD.” Their health benefits were apparently restored back to the date of their firings, according to the email, which told workers they would be billed for “missed premiums incurred” before their reinstatements.
“They’re making us responsible for insurance premiums for the period where we were terminated and had no insurance to use,” the Texas employee said. “What a mess.”
CBS News contacted the departments of Agriculture, Education, Health and Human Services, and Housing and Urban Development but has not received replies.
