Trump’s first-year government overhaul delivers change Washington hasn’t seen since the 1960s

The federal civilian workforce has shrunk to its smallest size in about six decades, according to new Bureau of Labor Statistics figures. Employment stood at 2. 67 million in August, versus a little over 3 million when President Donald Trump returned to office, the lowest level since 1966. Cutting the government's size was a central 2024 campaign pledge, later driven by the Department of Government Efficiency together with the Office of Personnel Management, according to Fox News.

The Office of Personnel Management projects its Deferred Resignation Program alone will save more than $20 billion annually. Yet the downsizing has carried costs. A Treasury watchdog reports that money brought in through IRS examinations declined 35%, falling to $6. 5 billion in fiscal 2025 from roughly $10 billion the year before, while examination and collection staffing dropped by nearly 10,000 employees. The Biden administration had secured nearly $80 billion in 2022 to modernize the agency and expand its workforce over a decade, and the Trump administration has proposed additional IRS reductions for 2027.

The reductions have been uneven. Education, Agriculture, and Housing and Urban Development saw especially deep cuts, whereas Homeland Security, which handles much of the president's immigration agenda, kept a largely steady headcount.

Summarized by PolitiKool from Fox News’s reporting. Read the full story at Fox News →