Musk sent an email over the weekend asking federal employees to report their work results or face being fired. Federal employees are suing the government over this. The employees said there are no rules or procedures requiring them to provide such reports to the Office of Personnel Management (OPM). They also said not all federal agencies instructed their employees to comply with the email's requirements.
"At least some federal agencies, including the FBI, began instructing employees not to respond to OPM's unexpected requests," the employee union said in an amended lawsuit filed Sunday in federal court in San Francisco.
The email, sent from an OPM address on Saturday, asked employees to submit a five-point report on "what you did last week" by the end of Monday. Musk previously previewed the request in a post on social media platform X.
Since Trump took office last month, Musk's Government Effectiveness team has gained access to sensitive data, organized a buyout program to move employees to "more productive" private sector jobs and laid off thousands of probationary workers.
Officials at the White House and OPM did not immediately respond to emails seeking comment.
In addition to the FBI, the Department of Homeland Security and the Department of Defense also asked their staff not to respond to the email.
Musk defended the move in a post on
"This mess will be resolved this week," Musk said in the post. "Many people are experiencing an epiphany and coming to terms with reality. They don't understand it yet, but they will eventually."
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