By David Shepardson
WASHINGTON (Reuters) – The U.S. Transportation Department told workers they should respond to a demand by President Donald Trump’s adviser Elon Musk to list their accomplishments in the past week by 11:59 p.m. ET on Monday.
USDOT has a workforce of about 57,000 people that includes the Federal Aviation Administration, National Highway Traffic Safety Administration and Federal Railroad Administration, regulating companies including Boeing and Musk’s Tesla.
The department’s email to employees on Monday said they should include about five bullet points of accomplishments but exclude classified information. Some other agencies have told employees not to respond to the demand from Musk, who is CEO of Tesla and SpaceX.
“If you can’t come up with five things that you did you know maybe you shouldn’t be employed here so again this is an easy task,” Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy told Fox News on Monday.
Duffy said the FAA cut 352 probationary employees out of about 45,000 total, while the Transportation Security Administration, which is part of the Homeland Security Department, said last week it had fired 243 probationary employees. NHTSA said on Monday it laid off 4% of its workforce.
The Trump administration sent air traffic controllers buyout offers but later said they were not eligible, also declaring other safety officials ineligible. The FAA remains about 3,500 controllers short of targeted staffing levels.
A persistent shortage of controllers has delayed flights and, at many facilities, controllers are working mandatory overtime and six-day weeks to cover shifts.
Duffy has said he is working on a plan to boost air traffic control staffing and improve technology, and is reconsidering rules that allowed air traffic control supervisors to reduce staffing at Washington’s Reagan National Airport before a fatal Army helicopter-plane collision that killed 67 people in January.
(Reporting by David Shepardson; Editing by Chizu Nomiyama and Bill Berkrot)
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