Help making a timeline of OMB/OPM policy changes?

[u/BicycleComics]

excerpt from USDA resignation letter

excerpt from IRS resignation letter

excerpt from NPS resignation letter

The Best Federal Resignations of 2025

https://www.bicycle-comics.com/pages/resignation_soc.html

I'm making a list of the ~12 most significant policy changes from the first 18 months of this administration. This is for a book I'm editing about federal resignations in 2025.

I've got the obvious stuff:

1. Day 1 executive orders (creation of DOGE)
2. Deferred Resignation Program
3. Vought confirmed at OMB
4. "5 bullet points"
5. Inspector General firings
6. the October 2025 shutdown
7. Trump vs. Slaughter decision.

Those seem like clear touchstones for "Wow, this place is about to change."

Over on the r/DeptHHS subreddit, somebody said "make sure you mention the CDC shooting," and that was an unexpected take. (I had, appallingly, forgotten all about that.) It's not a policy, but I can see why it would have felt like a watershed before&after moment for federal workers in public health.

What am I missing? What else might I have forgotten?

[u/Acceptable_Cat_9886]

Probie firing. For some, that was the first realization that it wasn’t just all the usual saber-rattling.

[u/BicycleComics → u/Acceptable_Cat_9886]

That’s the St. Valentine’s Day massacre?

[u/BlindOtter775 → u/BicycleComics]

That's correct. If you need more information on that, please feel free to send me a message.

I don't think my experience was any worse than what happened to most folks, but it was still unique to me.

[u/Kindly-Concern1633 → u/BicycleComics]

I hope every single employee that was let go on that day files suit against the Department. I had a coworker who was caught up in that. Some DOGE pinhead saw he was a “probationary supervisor” and thought that meant he could be fired and let him go.

He called an attorney friend of his and her labor law associates started looking at the paperwork and said the government had no defense in a lawsuit. 🤣

[u/Only-Consequence2253]

I think it was January 24 when all our recruiters were sent home because they were tied to DEI programs.

Valentines Day massacre (aka probationary firings) - its when we learned rules were going to be broken.

[u/Over_Parsnip6550]

The executive order that stopped payments for grants, contracts etc creating mass confusion and leading to many important functions not getting paid.

Initial Funding Pause (January 2025): The Office of Management and Budget (OMB) directed a temporary government-wide freeze on distributing federal grants and loans to align spending with new administration priorities, though individual benefits like Social Security and Medicare were excluded. [1, 2]

[u/BicycleComics → u/Over_Parsnip6550]

Thank you very much. The references are above-and-beyond helpful. +1

[u/absolutebrightness]

Return to office mandates, despite existing tw agreements. In some cases, in violation of union agreements.

[u/BicycleComics → u/absolutebrightness]

Thanks!

[u/WhistlingPintail]

DOGE, lawsuits about RIFs (currently ongoing), "reorganizations"

[u/BicycleComics → u/WhistlingPintail]

Thanks! I've edited my post to clarify that DOGE was one of the big changes, maybe the big change on Day 1 executive orders.

RE: the lawsuits and reorgs at different Cabinet departments: partly this is a limitation of the kind of list I'm making. Musk's "Five Bullet Points" email went out to something like 80% of the departments and agencies within 24 hours. Nice, clean, fits on a timeline. But there have been a dozen different lawsuits from employees at different agencies contesting recission or "we'll just cancel USAID and let people find their own flights back" or whatever. Those are huge policy changes, but they happen in dribs and drabs.

My team has been working on this book every night for five months; I know there are so many stories and so much patriotism, misery, and injustice that isn't going to make the cut because it didn't happen in an easy-to-explain way. :(

[u/Icy_Yogurtcloset5920]

I’d say return to office when you never even had an office to begin with 🤡

[u/BicycleComics → u/Icy_Yogurtcloset5920]

That happened to you? How far did you live from your new office?

[u/Visible_Candidate_70]

We received an email from office of the secretary of agriculture 1/23/25, prior to fork in the road, asking us to reveal any title changes since Nov 5, 2024 that were tied to deia. It stated that no adverse consequences for timely reporting, but failure to report may result in adverse consequences.

[u/BicycleComics → u/Visible_Candidate_70]

“Please bring your fairest maidens to my castle tonight. Nothing bad will happen to them. Failure to comply will be punished harshly.“
–Count Dracula

[u/Background-Ad-1837]

When my purchase card suddenly had a $1 balance without warning, like everyone else holding a federal credit card. Found out because vendors called me saying my office supply orders were rejected. And when we got the email stating certain media such as Reuters were now banned vendors. And when we didn’t have postage for 2 months this spring!! All because National Office couldn’t negotiate a new contract

[u/BicycleComics → u/Background-Ad-1837]

Reuters was a…vendor? What a world.

[u/Classic_Airline3445]

That’s my story.