Lawsuit challenges threat to federal workers

A newly amended lawsuit challenges a threat by Elon Musk to federal workers, which warned them over social media to respond to an email demanding them to submit by Monday a list of their accomplishments over the last week or face a forced “resignation.”

The new filing in San Francisco federal court comes amid confusion and controversy inside the federal government over whether employees must respond to that email Saturday from the Office of Personnel Management, and, if so, how. Some major departments, including the Pentagon, had told their employees to hold off on responding.

Musk, the CEO of Tesla and leader of several other companies, has been tasked by President Donald Trump with cutting federal government spending, and the number of federal workers. That effort is known as DOGE, which stands for Department of Government Efficiency.

The original lawsuit was filed Wednesday by a group of unions representing federal workers against OPM and acting OPM director Charles Ezell.

That suit asks a judge to enjoin OPM from terminating “tens of thousands of federal employees in contravention of federal constitutional and statutory law.”

On Feb. 13, OPM had ordered federal agencies “across the government to effectively eliminate the category of probationary employee, by terminating tens of thousands of federal employees en masse,” the suit says.

The suit was amended Sunday in reaction to OPM’s implementation of a “new mandatory reporting program for all federal employees throughout the federal government,” the complaint notes.

On Saturday, employees throughout the government, “employed at many different agencies, received the same email,” from a new OPM email address, with the title, “What did you do last week?” the suit notes.

“The body of the email stated: Please reply to this email with approx. 5 bullets of what you accomplished last week and cc your manager,” the email said. “Deadline is this Monday at 11:59 EST.”

Before Saturday, federal workers were not required to submit any reports on their work to OPM, the suit notes.

Musk on Saturday tweeted about the email on his social media site X.

“Consistent with President @realDonaldTrump’s instructions, all federal
employees will shortly receive an email requesting to understand what they got done last week,” Musk wrote.

“Failure to respond will be taken as a resignation,” Musk added in that tweet.

Musk’s threat was quickly condemned by Everett Kelley, president of the American Federation of Government Employees, one of the unions that has sued OPM seeking to block terminations of workers.

“Once again, Elon Musk and the Trump Administration have shown their utter disdain for federal employees and the critical services they provide to the American people,” Kelley said in a statement Saturday.

“It is cruel and disrespectful to hundreds of thousands of veterans who are wearing their second uniform in the civil service to be forced to justify their job duties to this out-of-touch, privileged, unelected billionaire who has never performed one single hour of honest public service in his life,” Kelley said.

The amended lawsuit says that before Saturday, “no notice was published, in the Federal Register or anywhere else, regarding any OPM program, rule, policy, or regulation requiring all federal employees to provide a report regarding their work to OPM.”

OPM “has not complied with any procedural requirements … with respect to this new program,” the suit alleges.

And, the suit, noted, after OPM sent out the blast email to federal workers on Saturday, “at least some federal agencies, including the Federal Bureau of Investigation, began telling their employees not to respond to this OPM surprise request.”

In addition to the FBI, the Justice Department, the Defense Department, the State Department, and national intelligence agencies have instructed their employees not to immediately respond to OPM’s email.

But the Transportation Department has told employees to respond, according to an email obtained by NBC News on Monday.

“Please also ensure that you exclude classified information, links, and attachments,” the email says.

Later Monday, a judge scheduled a hearing for Thursday afternoon on the unions’ request for a temporary restraining order blocking the mass terminations.