GSA shutters 18F, possibly leaving agencies in the lurch
The General Services Administration has eliminated its 18F program, an internal team of tech consultants and engineers that develops open-source tools to improve digital services across the federal government.
The announcement, which came overnight, is the latest in the Trump administration’s ongoing efforts to slash the federal workforce. It was foreshadowed weeks ago when Elon Musk, who’s become a highly influential and controversial voice in the White House, tweeted that the decade-old program had been “deleted.”
Early Saturday morning, Thomas Shedd — a mechanical engineer and former Tesla employee recently appointed as the director of GSA’s Technology Transformation Services, which houses 18F — announced the program had been eliminated as part of the ongoing reduction-in-force effort, according to an email viewed by FedScoop.
A GSA spokesperson also confirmed the terminations to FedScoop on Saturday, writing in an email that members of the 18F office “were notified yesterday that they had been identified as part of GSA’s Reduction in Force (RIF) and reorganization plan and were being separated from federal service. All notifications were conducted in accordance with OPM and GSA policies and guidelines.”
“No other TTS programs were affected. GSA is committed to fully supporting impacted employees as they transition from federal service,” they added. “GSA will continue to support the Administration’s drive to embrace best in class technologies to accelerate digital transformation and modernize IT infrastructure. This includes understanding what solutions are the most effective and necessary to meet the needs of our customer agencies and the American taxpayer.”
Shedd’s email cited the White House’s Feb. 10 executive order “Eliminating the Federal Executive Institute” and the Feb. 11 order “Department of Government Efficiency Workforce Optimization Initiative” as the reasoning for the program’s termination.
Pointing to guidance stating that GSA should cut “non-essential consulting” functions, Shedd wrote that the “18F Office has been identified as part of this phase of GSA’s Reduction in Force (RIF) as non-critical.”
“This decision was made with explicit direction from the top levels of leadership with both the Administration and GSA,” Shedd continued. “There are no other TTS programs impacted at this time, however we anticipate more change in the future.”
18F workers appear to have lost access to their government email accounts immediately after Shedd’s announcement, which was sent around 1 a.m.. Employees then began calling each other in the middle of the night to discuss the news, according to someone familiar with the termination
On platforms like LinkedIn and Blusky, now-former employees posted about the elimination of the program.
It’s not yet clear how federal agencies that expected assistance from the group will move forward. An online GitHub repository shows 18F’s ongoing work with a series of projects across the federal government, including plans to make improvements to weather.gov and projects with the Justice Department.
This story was updated March 1 with comments from a GSA spokesperson.
