The State Department informs the workforce of the ‘specific reduction’ in the next few days

The State Department plans to publish a letter to all employees on Thursday night informing them that the department is officially moving to implement a “specific reduction in the national workforce.”

“Soon, the department will communicate to the people affected by the reduction of force. First, we want to thank them for their dedication and service to the United States,” says La Letter, signed by the Deputy Secretary of Management and Resources Michael Rigas.

The letter advises that once these notifications have been made, the department will enter the “final stage” of reorganization, where the new organizational table presented by the Secretary of State Framework Rubio at the beginning of the year will enter into force.

The senior state department officials described the changes as “the most complicated reorganization in the history of the government”, emphasizing that the cuts were largely made to eliminate the dismissals of the era of the cold war, as well as eliminate the functions that “were no longer aligned with the president’s foreign policy priorities.”

“At the end of the day, we have to do the right thing for the mission,” said a senior official.

“There is a lot of unnecessary bureaucracy,” said the second official.

The State Department previously informed the Congress that would aim to reduce its national workforce by around 15% as part of the reorganization. However, the senior officials specified that more than half of that goal would be met through “voluntary reductions”: people who chose to take the deferred resignation plan offered through the “fork on the road” emails earlier this year.

The officials also said that the department had no current plans to reduce their strength abroad.

“The secretary wants to take this one step at the same time,” said an official.

The officials also defended the department’s decision to reduce some highly trained foreign service officers instead of reassigning them.