A group of 21 civil servants with technology expertise resigned on Tuesday rather than help implement an array of changes to the federal government being pushed by the billionaire Elon Musk and his Department of Government Efficiency.
The government employees had worked for the U.S. Digital Service, a technology-focused unit housed in the executive branch, that had been rebranded by Mr. Musk and President Trump as the United States DOGE Service. The resignations pared the unit, which had already been reduced by layoffs, by roughly a third.
“We will not use our skills as technologists to compromise core government systems, jeopardize Americans’ sensitive data, or dismantle critical public services,” the resigning group wrote in a letter addressed to Susie Wiles, Mr. Trump’s chief of staff. “We will not lend our expertise to carry out or legitimize DOGE’s actions.”
The resignations, which were reported earlier by The Associated Press, come as Mr. Musk and his allies have begun to radically reshape the size and scope of the federal government, engaging in layoffs, ending contracts and attempting to shutter entire agencies. Most recently, Mr. Musk created confusion for millions of federal employees by issuing a directive ordering them to detail what they had worked on during the previous week as a condition of keeping their jobs. Several Trump appointees ordered employees at their agencies to ignore Mr. Musk’s directive, even as workers received contradictory information about whether they need to comply with it.
The mass resignation at the technology unit is the latest action being taken by federal workers to resist President Trump and Mr. Musk’s extreme overhaul of government. Other civil servants have engaged in public protests, filed lawsuits and even filmed staff members working for Mr. Musk’s team in an attempt to identify them.
“DOGE’s actions — firing technical experts, mishandling sensitive data and breaking critical systems — contradict their stated mission of ‘modernizing federal technology and software to maximize governmental efficiency and productivity,’” the letter read. “These actions are not compatible with the mission we joined the United States Digital Service to carry out: to deliver better services to the American people through technology and design.”
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