Veterans, who make up a disproportionate share of federal employees, are feeling the brunt of the Trump administration’s rapid push to downsize the work force, generating discord in a reliable political base for Republicans.
Some Republican lawmakers are facing backlash at town hall gatherings where people have raised concerns about veterans being part of the deep cuts made by President Trump and his partner in this mission, the tech billionaire Elon Musk.
And in an act of protest, some Democrats are bringing fired veterans as their guests to Mr. Trump’s address to a joint session of Congress on Tuesday, where Mr. Trump is expected to outline more of his agenda.
Nearly 30 percent of civil service employees in the federal government are veterans, according to data as of September 2024 from the Office of Personnel Management, the government’s human resources arm.
Mr. Trump and Mr. Musk have fired about 20,000 employees who were in probationary status, based on data compiled by The New York Times. About 30 percent of those probationary workers — or 6,000 — were veterans, according to a count by Democrats on the House Appropriations Committee as of Feb. 23.
This includes more than 2,000 veterans at the Department of Defense, 676 at Treasury, about 500 at Energy and 450 at Agriculture.
More job losses are around the corner, as agencies begin a formal process known as “reduction in force,” including at the Pentagon where veterans make up 43 percent of the civilian work force, according to data from O.P.M.
A spokeswoman for O.P.M. said the agency was aware that restructuring can be difficult for the employees who are fired.
“O.P.M. recognizes the dedication and service of all federal employees, including our veteran work force, and remains committed to supporting them during this transition,” the spokeswoman, McLaurine Pinover, said in a statement on Monday.
Veterans who have already been fired are speaking out.
Jacob Bushno, a veteran who did two tours in Iraq while he was in the Army’s air assault division, was fired seven days shy of completing his one-year probationary period at the Forest Service.
“My mental health has been a roller coaster since this happened,” Mr. Bushno, who worked in the Shawnee National Forest in Illinois, said in an interview.
Mr. Bushno said his performance review at the end of September was positive. Yet, like thousands of other fired federal employees less than a year into their positions, his termination letter said he did not meet the agency’s standard and demonstrated poor performance. He is challenging his firing with an appeal to the Merit Systems Protection Board, an independent agency that reviews personnel actions.
Mr. Bushno has also appealed to his congressman, Representative Mike Bost, Republican of Illinois and the chairman of the House Veterans Affairs Committee. Mr. Bushno said he had yet to get a response from Mr. Bost, whose office did not respond to a request for comment.
“You know, they say they’re patriotic,” Mr. Bushno said of Mr. Bost and other Republicans who have been quiet on this issue. “I haven’t seen any patriotism out of them since all this has been going down.”
Mr. Bushno said he reached out to the office of Senator Tammy Duckworth, Democrat of Illinois, and heard back from someone the next day.
Democrats, out of power in Washington, are pushing back on Mr. Trump’s rapid culling of the federal work force, including putting Republicans on the defensive over the firings that have hit veterans hard.
On Tuesday, Representative Tom Barrett, Republican of Michigan, sent a letter to Doug Collins, the secretary of Veterans Affairs, writing that he supports the president’s goal of reducing the size of the federal bureaucracy but that he was “concerned that probationary but otherwise qualified veterans are being unintentionally let go in the process.”
Representative Mark Alford, Republican of Missouri, faced angry constituents at a town hall on Feb. 25 as he tried to assure them that he supports the country’s veterans.
“You do not care about us as federal employees,” Rebecca Reinholdt, who identified herself as the vice president the local American Federation of Government Employees union in Leavenworth, Kan., shouted at him.
Senator Roger Marshall, Republican of Kansas, was booed at a town hall on Saturday when people started criticizing the firing of veterans from the federal work force. Mr. Marshall left early.
And at a news conference last week, the co-chair of the House DOGE caucus, Representative Aaron Bean, Republican of Florida, said he knew veterans are hard workers and is confident they will find other jobs. (DOGE is the acronym for the Department of Government Efficiency, the group established by Mr. Trump and led by Mr. Musk that has directed the job cuts.)
“And if anybody can overcome obstacles of getting another job, it’s our veterans,” Mr. Bean said.
Mr. Trump said he was aware of the veterans affected by the firings.
“We take good care of our veterans, so we’re watching that very carefully, and we hope it’s going to be as small a number as possible,” Mr. Trump said last Thursday in the Oval Office. “But we are having great success at slimming down our government.”
Senator Tim Kaine, Democrat of Virginia, said Mr. Trump has waged a “war” on veterans with these firings.
“And I’m calling it a war on veterans, because I don’t think it can be just chalked up to accidental when the people making these decisions know who the federal work force is,” Mr. Kaine said in an interview on Monday.
If Democrats are loud in opposing these cuts, Mr. Kaine said, he believes this is one area where Mr. Trump could back down.
Mr. Kaine said that was why many Democrats, including him, are bringing fired veterans to Mr. Trump’s address to a joint session of Congress on Tuesday.
“We’re going to continue to really push this and get louder and louder,” said Mr. Kaine, whose guest will be a disabled veteran from Fairfax who was fired from the Federal Aviation Administration’s safety division.
Senator Ruben Gallego, Democrat of Arizona, is bringing a veteran from North Phoenix who was recently fired from his national security job at the Homeland Security Department.
The Senate minority leader, Chuck Schumer of New York, is hosting an Army veteran, Alissa Ellman, who was recently fired from the Veterans Benefits Administration in Buffalo, N.Y., where she helped veterans with education claims.
“If this is really about government efficiency, then you’re doing a really bad job when you fire people who are working really hard,” said Ms. Ellman, who was deployed to Afghanistan.
Representative Jen A. Kiggans, Republican of Virginia, is one of few Republicans to speak publicly against these cuts. On Monday, she sent a letter to the defense secretary, Pete Hegseth, urging him to prioritize veterans when making future cuts, including finding other federal positions for them.
“Many of these veterans already experience the daily challenges of transitioning to civilian life, and facing such layoffs only add to their undue burden,” Ms. Kiggans, whose district includes Hampton Roads where many veterans are working in civilian jobs, wrote on Monday.
The federal government has prioritized hiring veterans and streamlined the process at the beginning of the Obama administration. Toward the end of his first administration, Mr. Trump issued an executive order directing agencies to hire a work force based on skills and not on where the applicant received a college degree.
The Biden administration continued the practice, said William Resh, a public policy professor at the University of Southern California, said.
As a result, many of the probationary employees who have been fired were hired on merit, just as Mr. Trump called for in 2020, Mr. Resh said.
And on its website, the Office of Personnel Management touts the value of hiring veterans: “We recognize those who have served in our armed forces often have the experience, skills and dedication necessary to achieve success as members of our civilian work force, and it is critical that we harness that talent.”
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