House Democrats urge agency heads to refute OPM email, Musk message
More than 100 House Democrats are demanding “immediate action” from agency leaders in response to Elon Musk’s “public threat” that all federal workers respond to an Office of Personnel Management email or risk termination.
In a letter sent Monday, Democratic lawmakers asked the heads of all 24 Chief Financial Officers Act agencies to “clarify that the federal employees at your agency are not obligated to respond to this ill-conceived email stunt and that nonresponse cannot constitute resignation.”
The letter, which was led by House Oversight and Government Reform Committee ranking member Gerry Connolly of Virginia, refers to a pair of Saturday posts on X by Musk telling federal workers that they must respond to an email with bullet points detailing what they had accomplished in the past week. “Failure to respond will be taken as a resignation,” Musk wrote. An email from OPM followed and confusion ensued.
“The nature of Mr. Musk’s employment is opaque, likely unlawful, and has been cloaked in secrecy since day one of this Administration,” the letter states. “What is clear and reflected in the cruel dismissal-threat tweet and ham-handed OPM email that followed, is that Mr. Musk lacks a basic understanding of how the federal government works. For example, the OPM email was sent to individuals who do not even work in the Executive Branch — including sitting federal judges.”
The letter noted that some agency heads, including FBI Director Kash Patel, responded quickly, telling staffers to not respond to the OPM message.
“The FBI, through the Office of the Director, is in charge of all of our review processes and will conduct reviews in accordance with FBI procedures,” Patel wrote. “When and if further information is required, we will coordinate the responses. For now, please pause any responses.”
House Democrats also pointed out that many federal workers may not even be able to meet OPM’s 11:59 p.m. Monday deadline; some could be on medical leave, others could be away from their secure workstation, and others simply may be “away from their email for completely justifiable reasons,” the letter said.
Musk also “appears to be unaware that many federal employees are locked out of their systems due to DOGE’s ongoing intrusion into federal information technology infrastructure,” Democrats added.
The lawmakers also raised questions about how Musk or OPM would be able to review the up to 2 million responses from across the federal government “without diverting resources and costing the American people money and services.”
The message from OPM comes amid ongoing legal wrangling over the personnel agency’s use of a server that enables it to send mass email blasts to the entire federal workforce. A group of government workers has sued the agency over its use of the system, alleging that it skirted federal law in setting up the authorized, insecure server.
