My brother is a federal scientist. My sister voted for Donald Trump.
The federal bureaucracy, to her, is the Deep State. She wasn’t thinking about family.
That’s my piece of the great American disconnect, the notion that civil servants are the problem. I’m not alone.
“It’s just so frustrating to hear the narratives that come out right now,” said Julie Breed, a project manager at NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center who was recently forced into early retirement. “You know, civil servants are lazy and scientists are making things up.”
We’re in the early days of what looks to be a lengthy shuttering of federal agencies over the Republican inability to pass a budget. President Donald Trump’s first-term shutdown lasted 35 days.
Congressional Democrats say they won’t provide their votes without compromise — renewing tax credits that make Obamacare premiums affordable.
This time around, the shutdown will be worse for the 2.2 million federal employees, roughly 150,000 of them in Maryland. Trump is threatening to fire “vast numbers” if Democrats don’t cave.
So, before the president and his party continue their wanton disassembly of the federal workforce, it’s a good moment to appreciate the people we’re about to lose if they succeed.
It is time to give the beleaguered civil servant a bit of overdue gratitude.
“So much of what civil servants do, honestly, is super boring,” said a Health and Human Services analyst, who was afraid to be named out of fear of retribution. “How do you run a trillion-dollar business every year that changes radically every few years? You’ve got to have people who have a base knowledge and are willing to adapt with the times.”
We’re accustomed to thanking veterans for their service. Not every veteran is a hero, but they all gave years to the idea that America is worth defending.
Just like those men and women in military uniform, federal civil servants take an oath. Just like them, they promise to support and defend the Constitution.
How did we forget that?
“I think federal service has been just considered a thankless job for so long because people didn’t understand the employees or their work,” said Quay Crowner, let go from her job as an ombudsman in the U.S. Department of Education.
You meet lots of federal workers in Annapolis. It’s a nice place with a manageable commute. If it’s more expensive than it once was, what community isn’t?
The civil servants I spoke with could just as easily live in Rockville or Lutherville, Ellicott City or Baltimore. They’re all in various stages of being pushed out this year — job eliminated, waiting for formal retirement or on leave without pay.
They’re all leaving public service jobs that were about more than a paycheck. As we talked about their careers, they all slipped into the present tense.
“We take that term servant — civil servant — very seriously,“ Breed said. “We appreciate the opportunity to, my God, push forward the state of knowledge for the entire planet.”
If Trump embodies enmity toward this workforce today — the same one that helped win World War II, then cared for this nation and the wider world in the 80 years since then — its roots run deep.
President Harry Truman started it in 1947, hoping to root out communists with a loyalty test. U.S. Sen. Joe McCarthy built on that fear with Red Scare congressional hearings.
They pale compared to President Dwight D. Eisenhower, who looked at all those new federal office buildings in 1953 and decided homosexuality was a national security risk. The subsequent “lavender” hunt purged, by some estimates, 1% of the 2 million federal workers.
Other presidents called it big government and red tape. Their reforms ended up just shifting jobs from civilian to defense agencies or to private contractors at greater expense.
Trump’s assault on government will beat them all. The Office of Personnel Management estimates that 15% of the 2.29 million federal employees at the start of 2025 will be pushed out by year’s end.
Sure, there’s bureaucratic shambling. It’s the people usually blamed for it who are best suited to solve it. They signed up to study the earth from orbit, to make college affordable or to fund nonprofits that care for children.
These cuts are not about cost savings, efficiency or even values.
Crowner helped students with loan programs. Her termination letter explained the cut as part of Trump’s reversal of diversity and equity initiatives.
“My job had nothing to do with DEI, and they said we’ll let you know,” she said. “They never got back to me.”
No, this is about breaking a force for good built over eight decades.
More civil servants will leave, shown the door or walking through it out of self-preservation.
“They have to put food on the table,” Breed said. “They’re getting jobs in other countries, so that’s not very smart for national security. It’s just dumb.”
Federal employees will tell you that public service kept the country moving toward a more perfect union, directed by elections but also apart from them.
Maybe that can be rebuilt, but not until the sense of betrayal passes.
Some who are leaving are fighting back. Crowner signed on to a class action lawsuit that claims mass firings violate civil service laws.
“I have no idea what resolution is going to look like,” she said. “It was more about, I am not going to let this stand.”
Some of those left behind may find ways to do their jobs without support from the top.
“Their fight is a silent fight,” said the former HHS analyst.
I don’t know if my brother and sister have talked about what’s happening.
He’s hanging on to his job, for now. He got the retirement memo, the one that threatens what might happen if he stays.
Before it’s too late: To him and those in anonymous federal jobs everywhere, thank you.
Thank you for your service.
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