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303
Musk and allies have reportedly seized key HR office to send mass resignation email (www.independent.co.uk)
submitted 1 month ago by MicroWave to c/news
25 comments fedilink hide all child comments
 

Summary

Elon Musk and his allies have reportedly taken control of the Office of Personnel Management (OPM) and bypassed officials to send a mass resignation email to over 2.3 million federal employees.

The email, titled “Fork in the Road,” offers buyouts to those who voluntarily resign, mirroring a similar approach Musk used at Twitter.

Musk has placed close associates in leadership positions at OPM, raising concerns over his growing influence in Trump's administration.

Federal employees remain skeptical about the buyout’s legitimacy.

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[–] givesomefucks 159 points 1 month ago* (last edited 1 month ago) (5 children)

He didn't seize shit...

They made up an email address, claimed it was OPM, then spent an afternoon pretending to be official between that and the fork in the road email.

Apparently from metadata, it's not even a real email for OPM, it's being spoofed.

The whole thing is an absolute shit show.

But on the upside all it seems to be doing is delaying the retirements of everyone who was already planning on leaving when trump came back.

They have no idea what a bureaucrat will put up with out of spite, and a large amount of Feds didn't like their loyalty called into question by some ai slop pretending to be from a federal agency.

Edit:

They sent another last night too, a "FAQ" talking about how you'll get paid till the end of the fiscal year...

Like government employees aren't fucking aware we're on a continuing resolution... There's zero money to offer here, and a "FAQ" isn't binding.

That's not even getting I to how a couple agencies are saying if anyone takes it, they lose the position for good.

Like a 10 person office, if 2 take it, it's now permanently an 8 person office.

It's an obvious trick. And all it's doing is galvanizing the federal workforce

Edit 2:

And if you're not up to speed, the emails are 100% "written" by the 19 year old using chatbots.

https://www.yahoo.com/news/top-hires-trump-office-personnel-183345778.html

[–] [email protected] 66 points 1 month ago (3 children)

They made up an email address, claimed it was OPM, then spent an afternoon pretending to be official between that and the fork in the road email.

Isn't that a crime? Pretending to be a federal agency when you're not?

[–] MasterBlaster 43 points 1 month ago

Oh, hi! Glad to see you're awake. Here's some coffee. Let me explain what happened in the last six months while you were out... To much to explain. Let me sum up.

Trump is a convicted felon at least 30 times over, was elected to office, then sprung the insurrectionists who helped him. He's broken the law dozens of times in and out of office without consequence, and packed the supreme court with lackeys. Congress is controlled by his other lackeys.

At this point, there is ample evidence that the fact it was a crime has no bearing on whether or not they will fail to get their desired outcome. Playing by the rules will only get your ass whooped and tossed aside.

Our situation requires grit and willingness to sacrifice in solidarity in order to regain our country.

[–] givesomefucks 36 points 1 month ago

There's already a lawsuit

The new legal challenge comes as the Trump administration has launched a multi-front effort to overhaul how the federal workforce operates, including initiatives to weaken federal workforce protections and to eliminate diversity, equity and inclusion programs, among other actions.

According to the new lawsuit, federal employees in recent days received emails from the email address [email protected] that purported to be running tests for a new “distribution and response list.”

https://www.cnn.com/2025/01/27/politics/federal-employees-email-system-privacy-concerns-lawsuit/index.html

They didn't even wait for the "fork" email...

The part about metadata showing it's not coming from OPM but private email servers would come out of discovery on that

[–] horse_battery_staple 16 points 1 month ago

Who daresay will prosecute?

[–] [email protected] 28 points 1 month ago (1 children)

Didn't Musk offer the same thing to Twitter employees when he bought it, and then never paid them the leave money

[–] [email protected] 30 points 1 month ago* (last edited 1 month ago)

I have read there are ongoing court cases about Twitter not paying the people that resigned.

[–] [email protected] 26 points 1 month ago (1 children)

My wife shared a thread from Reddit with me where a lot of federal workers who were feeling demotivated and like they may want to bail are now saying they will absolutely not leave, and will resist.

It’s one thing to proceed methodically and slowly and to strangle the workers off in ways that can’t be overcome. It’s entirely another to try to trick them into quitting and rug pull them.

In their shoes, I would be going full bureaucrat mode. To the extent legally possible, every HR, or HR-like email gets printed or stored somewhere that isn’t on a server that it can be remotely deleted from. Every meeting recorded. Every document preserved to the fullest extent that the law/FOIA/retention policies require. Heck, they should probably try to preemptively have a shortlist of employment lawyers, or even have a consult with one to make sure they’re being proactive for what may come.
I mean, if they like the job and want to fight for it/want to slow down these insidious changes.

[–] givesomefucks 15 points 1 month ago (1 children)

isn’t on a server that it can be remotely deleted from.

The scuttlebutt is all the HR@opm emails are coming from an outside server someone just walked into OPM and plugged into the network lol.

It's a total shit show

[–] [email protected] 8 points 1 month ago

A total shit shower, one might say.

The email with the subject “Important Weather Alert” read, “The next 4 years has a 99% chance of shit showers. Our president is a retard and his VP is a f—. We’re cooked. Please reply.”
— Trump Change Causes Flood of Crude Spam Emails to Federal Workers

This is hilarious and incredibly stupid. I hope all the people impacted are of the disposition to delight in chaos, rather than be harmed by it.

[–] soEZ 0 points 1 month ago

Unfortunately all other agencies seem to be going along with it. DOE, said they will honor all the terms...

[–] [email protected] 41 points 1 month ago (3 children)

I mean at what point is this criminal behavior?

[–] [email protected] 22 points 1 month ago

When someone does something. Until then, it may as well be legal...

[–] [email protected] 13 points 1 month ago

Right now. At what point will anyone care?

[–] [email protected] 9 points 1 month ago

Half the country supports this and thinks the government doesn't do anything. They've completely bought into the right wing narrative. This was the inevitable conclusion to that. Now these ghouls are going to break everything.

Even if Democrats got elected now, the damage to institutions will take decades to fix. And most of the country is barely aware of any of it.

[–] [email protected] 17 points 1 month ago

This happened like a week ago.

[–] billwashere 12 points 1 month ago (2 children)

Here’s the problem with this. Employees who take voluntary layoffs often have a lot of confidence in their ability to find new work. They believe in their skills and aren’t worried about landing another job. On the other hand, those who stay might be less motivated and less sure about their chances in the job market. They might feel uncertain about being hired elsewhere, which can lead to feeling stuck and less satisfied with their job. This creates a situation where the more confident and capable employees are the ones who are more likely to leave, while those who stay might be more cautious or less optimistic about their career options.

So what you end up doing is scraping the cream from the top and leaving the less talented. In the business world this is a good way to boost short term profits but what you’re left with often goes bankrupt. It’s happened multiple times in the tech world.

[–] coriza 11 points 1 month ago (1 children)

You see, your mistake was thinking that they want to make things better and are just misguided. The point is to gut the government and make it bad.

[–] billwashere 2 points 1 month ago

I don’t even think that’s the complete end goal. I think they want a bunch of people either completely loyal and will do whatever they ask or completely fearful and act the exact same way.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 1 month ago (1 children)

To destabilize is the goal.

Also there are federal employees who have chronic illnesses and can‘t change employer as easily since not every other employer has the same benefits.

[–] billwashere 1 points 1 month ago

Yeah I never even considered your second thing. Excellent point.

[–] 800XL 8 points 1 month ago

Musk needs to go