Mass terminations at the U.S. Department of Agriculture are “crippling” the agency, upending federal workers’ lives and leaving farmers and rural communities without needed support, according to interviews with 15 recently fired employees stationed across the U.S.

Since taking power Jan. 20, the Trump administration has quickly frozen funding and fired federal workers en masse. USDA terminations started Feb. 13, the day Agriculture Secretary Brooke Rollins was sworn in. Rollins welcomed the quasi-governmental Department of Government Efficiency, or DOGE, led by billionaire Elon Musk, to find parts of the USDA budget to cut.

Terminated employees helped farmers build irrigation systems, battled invasive diseases that could “completely decimate” crops that form whole industries and assisted low-income seniors in rural areas in fixing leaky roofs. That work will now be significantly delayed — perhaps indefinitely — as remaining employees’ workloads grow, the employees said.

“It’s really crippling the agency,” said Bryan Mathis, a former USDA employee based in New Mexico.

Caught up in the terminations are single parents and new moms, recent hires and longtime employees, and military veterans. Some had uprooted their lives months ago to start their new career. Justin Butt, also based in New Mexico, said that without the health insurance and parental leave offered by his federal job, he and his wife may hold off on having a child.

Many of the USDA employees were on probationary status, meaning they had worked less than a year (or three years, in some instances) in the civil service. However, several had put in years working for the government and had been permanent employees at other federal departments.

The terminations have left employees distrustful and leery of returning to public service. “I don’t feel safe,” said Latisha Caldwell-Bullis, who served in the Army for 21 years before joining a USDA office in Oklahoma. “The whole reason I got back into the federal system was because it has job security.”

The USDA did not return a request for comment. In an interview with Brownfield Ag News, Rollins said her department has done “significant reinstatements” but added new job cuts might be coming. “I do think that moving forward, it will be more intentional,” she said.

The American Farm Bureau Federation, which represents farmers and rural communities across the country, said cuts at USDA should be “strategic.” The farm bureau has supported the Trump administration.

“Reports are still coming in about staffing decisions at USDA, which are causing concern in rural communities and beyond,” Sam Kieffer, the farm bureau’s vice president of public policy, said in a statement to Investigate Midwest. “USDA plays a vital role in ensuring a safe and abundant food supply, from loan officers and disaster recovery experts to food inspectors, animal disease specialists and more.

“We support the goal of responsibly spending taxpayer dollars,” the statement continued, “but we urge the administration to empower the Secretary to make strategic staffing decisions, knowing the key roles USDA staff play in the nation’s food supply.”

Leading up to the terminations, a feeling of unease pervaded USDA offices, said a former employee based in the Midwest who requested anonymity to protect job prospects. The employee’s agency within the USDA used to have regular town halls, but they were canceled after the “fork in the road” email — which promised federal workers a buyout — hit inboxes in late January. “Then, basically, it was crickets from our leadership,” the employee said.

As news of mass firings at other agencies circulated, USDA staffers wondered if they were next. Some cried in offices. Others coped by telling jokes.

The firings were haphazard. 

Many received the same email late at night on Feb. 13 saying they were terminated immediately. Jacob Zortman, who sold his house in Kansas in January to move to Nevada, received his work phone on Friday, Feb. 14, only to be fired the following Tuesday, he said. 

Another employee said his job title was listed incorrectly on the termination letter. One said they had received an award days before their termination. Several employees said their supervisors had no idea they were fired.

Mathis, who worked for the Forest Service, received a phone call on Monday, Feb. 17, a federal holiday, from a higher-up, who told him he was fired, he said. His direct supervisor was instructed to terminate him but refused. 

“It kind of went up the chain,” he said.

Doug Berry, who worked for the USDA’s Rural Development agency in Texas, said, when he attempted to get a copy of his performance review, it was “mysteriously blank.” He then asked his supervisor to write him a recommendation but was rebuffed. The supervisor mentioned an interview Berry gave to USA TODAY, in which he said his agency “helps the towns that voted for Trump every day.”

“I don’t know who’s watching what, but as soon as they saw my comments, any good will evaporated,” he said.

Another former USDA employee, who requested anonymity to protect job prospects, said the terminations will result in a leadership void. The job cuts affected training intended to give the new generation of leaders a holistic view of the agency.

“It’s just going to create a lot of chaos,” the employee said.

DOGE claims cuts are for efficiency

DOGE’s stated goal is to improve efficiency across the government, but former employees said they were already working on improving government service efficiencies.

When one former employee joined the department six months ago, they faced a five-year backlog. They had worked through three years when they were terminated, said the employee, who is based in a Western state and requested anonymity to protect future job prospects. Now, other workers will “have to pick up the slack,” meaning delays for projects that farmers and ranchers want done.

Stephanie Gaspar worked for a USDA agency that helped prevent plant, animal and insect diseases from entering the nation’s food supply. Her job was to decrease IT costs. “I and my team had already reduced tens of thousands of dollars of the budget,” she said. “It’s going to cost more in the long run because there’s not enough people to do this work.”

Gaspar, based in Florida, said she had worked hard to get her position. “This ultimately was going to be a career that would pull me out of poverty,” she said. “I’m not some rich federal worker. I’m a working mom.”

Rural development workers axed

One of the USDA’s many responsibilities is providing financial assistance to rural, low-income communities. For example, a small town in central West Virginia requested USDA’s help to find funding for a new police cruiser. 

Rural Development was also coordinating a plan to help impoverished families access transportation to medical care, said Carrie Decker, a single mom of four children who worked in the West Virginia office. “You have three generations sharing one vehicle, and people have to work and get to school, so finding time to go to a dentist appointment is not high on the priority list,” she said. The project now lacks USDA support, which could delay it.

After the Trump administration took over, she and her coworkers were instructed not to perform community outreach, which was “90% of what we do,” Decker said. Decker worries the lack of investment in rural areas — which Trump largely won in his reelection bid — will have long-lasting consequences.

“We’re going to see less funding into these critical access places that really, really need to have it and have needed it for decades,” she said. “I think what’s going to happen is these rural places across the nation are going to continue to decline instead of see the growth and opportunity that we were hopeful for.”

Two primary goals of rural development are to provide affordable housing and to help maintain low-income seniors’ homes.

One former USDA employee in the South, who requested anonymity to protect future job prospects, said they were hired to help expedite environmental compliance reviews, which were required before any funding was disbursed. Before they started, the employee said, another employee performed these duties on top of a full-time job.

The situation delayed help to seniors, the employee said. “Their roof is being covered up by a tarp because it’s been blown off by a storm, and they can’t get their grant money to get their roof fixed until compliance reviews are done,” they said. Former coworkers would “basically hound the guy to get it done. It wasn’t efficient.”

Risks of possible crop disease outbreaks

The USDA also invests heavily in preventing diseases among plants and animals essential to the food supply. 

But the department fired employees working to address the bird flu that’s contributing to skyrocketing egg prices, according to NBC News. The USDA said it was trying to rehire them.

Matthew Moscou worked at a lab in Minnesota, where he helped monitor diseases that could wipe out wheat production in the U.S., he said. He spent the past two-and-a-half years learning from a long-tenured employee so institutional knowledge could be passed on, but it’s unlikely that information is retained now, he said. 

“They’ve destroyed the institution,” he said.

Without labs like this, crop diseases, such as wheat-killing stem rust, could flourish, he said. 

“Either we’re going to have to rethink how we’re doing this whole thing, or we’re going to have a significant collapse in the long run,” Moscou said. “This current push has really cut us off at the knees.”

Since Investigate Midwest interviewed Moscou, he has been reinstated, at least temporarily, according to his LinkedIn profile.

Mass terminations have cut USDA ‘off at the knees,’ ex-employees say is a post from Wisconsin Watch, a non-profit investigative news site covering Wisconsin since 2009. Please consider making a contribution to support our journalism.

The U.S. Department of Agriculture announced late Friday afternoon that some of its programs funding renewable energy projects are “operating as normal,” but left open the question of whether billions more in loans and grants promised to farmers, small rural businesses and electric cooperatives would be honored. 

The day before, Agriculture Secretary Brooke Rollins had said the department would continue to review spending under the Biden administration’s sweeping climate law, the Inflation Reduction Act, “to ensure that programs are focused on supporting farmers and ranchers” and not “far-left climate programs.”

Among those waiting for clarity are Travis and Amy Forgues of western Wisconsin. About two years ago, the couple bought the Hidden Springs Creamery, an 80-acre sheep dairy nestled in the hills of Westby, Wisconsin. Twice a day they milk 300 sheep to make cheese, including a creamy feta that last year won second place in the American Cheese Society’s annual competition.

As part of their effort to modernize the farm, the Forgueses decided to install a solar array to power their operation. To offset the $134,000 cost of installation, they applied for a $56,000 Rural Energy for America Program (REAP) grant from the U.S. Department of Agriculture.

Last year, they got approved for the grant and built the solar array, never doubting that the USDA would pay once the project was completed, as outlined in the contract they signed with the feds. 

But last week, the Forgueses said they received an email from the USDA saying the program had been paused, leaving them scrambling to figure out how to pay for the rest of their new solar array.

“You can’t have people spend this kind of money and then just pull the rug from (them),” said Travis Forgues. “I didn’t spend the money thinking maybe I’ll get it back. I spent the money because we had a signed contract.”

The pause was the result of an executive order issued by President Donald Trump on his first day in office freezing hundreds of billions of dollars for renewable energy — including REAP.

At least 7,500 farms and rural businesses across the country have received REAP grants from the USDA since 2023, according to a Floodlight analysis of USDA grant data.

On Friday, a USDA spokesperson said some funding for REAP would operate as normal, but only if it came through the Farm Bill. That apparently won’t help the Forgueses or potentially thousands of other farmers like them who had more than 25% of their project paid for by the USDA. That’s the cutoff point where funding from the Farm Bill stopped and funding from the Inflation Reduction Act started.

Since 2023, when Inflation Reduction Act funding became available, the USDA has given or loaned approximately $21.3 billion through programs that could be used to support renewable energy in rural areas, according to a Floodlight analysis of agency data.

The legality of the continued freeze in federal funding remains unclear.

On Friday, a federal judge in Rhode Island kept in place a temporary restraining order from Jan. 31 that ordered the Trump administration to stop withholding federal funds appropriated by Congress. Attorneys general from 22 states and the District of Columbia, led by New York, argued that the broad funding freeze violated the separation of powers and several other laws.

The lone attorney representing the Trump administration argued that the agencies were exercising their lawful discretion.

Rural electric companies also hit

Some programs, like REAP, go directly to farmers looking to place solar panels or wind turbines on their land. Others, like the New Era program, help rural electric cooperatives build renewable energy to lower members’ monthly bills. New Era was not among the programs cited by the USDA spokesperson as operating as normal.

The Yampa Valley Electric Association, which serves Steamboat Springs, Colorado, and parts of Wyoming, expected to get $50 million from the USDA’s New Era program, according to Carly Davidson, the co-op’s public relations specialist. 

New Era is the USDA program dedicated solely to renewables that has allocated the most money, more than $4.3 billion in grants since 2023, according to a Floodlight analysis. 

The Yampa Valley association was planning to use the money to purchase renewable energy to keep electricity costs low for its members, Davidson wrote in a statement. The project is still in the planning stages, but it would provide both solar generation and battery storage, according to Yampa Valley Electric. 

Connexus Energy, Minnesota’s largest consumer-owned electric cooperative, was hoping to use its $170 million in New Era grants to build out its renewable generation portfolio, spokesperson Stacy Downs said. The co-op, which serves over 146,000 customers, still hopes the funds will come through so it can add solar, wind and hydropower, as well as battery storage, Downs said, adding, “We’re still hoping to be receiving them.”

Electric infrastructure program intact

The largest USDA energy program, the Electric Infrastructure Loan and Loan Guarantee Program, offers money to rural co-ops, which use it to expand or upgrade their power grids with new transmission lines and smart-grid technology. That program, which allows for the connection of more renewables, has loaned out $12 billion since 2023. 

On Friday, a USDA spokesperson stated that the program was operating as normal, along with four other USDA programs that could potentially be used to reduce carbon emissions: Rural Energy Savings Program, REAP Program with funding appropriated through the Farm Bill, Guaranteed Underwriter Program, and High Energy Cost Grants.

“These freezes seem to be intentionally chaotic and unclear,” said Hannah Smith-Brubaker, executive director of Pasa Sustainable Agriculture, a nonprofit that helps farmers adopt sustainable practices and that also receives money from the USDA.

“We are fielding calls every day from farmers who are mid-project, and their contractor wants to know when they’re going to be paid.”

Rural businesses, farmers still waiting 

Patrick Hagar, co-owner of Squashington Farm near Mount Horeb, Wisconsin, is feeling that uncertainty. Hagar and his wife purchased a 20-acre farm three years ago in southern Wisconsin, where they grow organic produce.

Last fall, they put money down to purchase a solar array that will end up costing them $50,000, he said. They were promised $15,000 back from the USDA through a REAP grant.

“The vast majority of the fossil fuel energy and carbon outputs are being put forth by a small (group) of really wealthy businesses,” Hagar said. “I don’t think that absolves small farms and small businesses from trying to do what they can.” 

But, he added, “It’s frustrating to have a signed contract for something, and feel like, you know, you live in a country where a signed contract doesn’t mean what a signed contract has always meant.”

And it’s not just farmers affected by the freeze. Small rural business owners who qualify for various USDA renewable grants and loans are also waiting to see what happens with USDA’s review of funding — money the agency has already agreed to pay.

Atul Patel, owner of the Holiday Inn in Frackville, Pennsylvania, planned to install a solar system on his hotel costing just over $360,000.

“We would like to be energy independent,” Patel said. “In this area, the lights flicker a lot.”

Patel said he put 20% down on the project and was planning to finish the installation once the weather improved in the spring. 

He added, “Our fingers are crossed.”

Floodlight is a nonprofit newsroom that investigates the powerful interests stalling climate action.

‘Chaotic’ USDA funding freeze stalls rural renewable projects is a post from Wisconsin Watch, a non-profit investigative news site covering Wisconsin since 2009. Please consider making a contribution to support our journalism.