Elon Musk’s team in the Department of Government Efficiency reportedly plans to asses responses to the productivity email demand by filtering them through an artificial intelligence program to determine if a person’s job is critical, according to NBC News.
Over the weekend, the Office of Personnel Management asked hundreds of thousands of federal workers to respond to an email with five bullet points listing what they accomplished last week, at Musk’s directive.
Staffers at DOGE allegedly plan to feed email responses through a Large Language Model AI system to determine if federal workers’ jobs are necessary, a source told the news outlet.
The advanced AI system can process large amounts of text and generate a summary.
It is seemingly part of Musk and President Donald Trump’s attempt to drastically cut down the federal workforce.
The Independent has asked the Office of Personnel Management for comment.
However, Musk pushed back on that accusation on Monday, writing on X, “No LLM needed here.”
The tech billionaire said the email requesting productivity notes from thousands of federal workers was “basically a check to see if the employee had a pulse and was capable of replying to an email.”
However, the request spun much of the remaining federal workforce into confusion and worry over the weekend after Musk wrote on X that those who did not reply by Monday evening would be assumed to resign.
No LLM needed here. This was basically a check to see if the employee had a pulse and was capable of replying to an email.
— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) February 24, 2025
This mess will get sorted out this week.
Lot of people in for a rude awakening and strong dose of reality. They don’t get it yet, but they will.
The email from an “hr” email from the Office of Personnel Management did not include the threat itself.
National intelligence-adjacent agencies and departments such as the Department of Defense and FBI informed staffers not to reply to the email. Tulsi Gabbard, the director of national intelligence, directed intelligence community workers to ignore the email due to the sensitivity of their job.
The State Department also told employees not to reply, saying it would respond on their behalf.
But other departments and agencies, such as the Department of Transportation, did tell staffers to reply to the email.
By Monday, personnel offices had informed employees that responses to the Office of Personnel Management’s request were “voluntary”.
The Office of Personnel Management sent another email, reiterating the request but adding a caveat that agency heads could exclude some personnel “at their discretion.”
But Musk reiterated the threat hours later, saying those who did not respond would be given a second chance or face “termination.”
“The email request was utterly trivial, as the standard for passing the test was to type some words and press send!” Musk wrote on X.
“Yet so many failed even that inane test, urged on in some cases by their managers. Have you ever witnessed such INCOMPETENCE and CONTEMPT for how YOUR TAXES are being spent?”
