WASHINGTON (dpa-AFX) - A senior defense official told the media that approximately 21,000 civilian employees of the U.S. Defense Department have agreed to participate in the Deferred Resignation Program.
The DRP, implemented by the Office of Personnel Management, offered most full-time federal employees - including most of the nearly 900,000 DOD civilians - the opportunity to resign with full pay and benefits until September 30.
The Defense Department is aiming to achieve a strategic reduction in manpower of 5-8 percent, or approximately 50,000-60,000 employees.
'When DRP was offered broadly to the workforce, there was very good participation [with volunteer] civilian employees raising their hands and saying they would like to be considered to go on [administrative] leave and be paid throughout that time,' the senior defense official said, adding that the department has approved a majority of the applications.
The official said the downsizing of the workforce would not have any impact on the uniformed force.
The DPR is one initiative in a three-part strategy the Pentagon is implementing while realigning its civilian workforce. The other two measures are a hiring freeze and the removal of certain probationary employees.
DOD's hiring freeze, ordered by Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth on February 28, acts as a 'passive attrition measure,' the official said.
By freezing the approximately 6,000 employees the Defense Department had been hiring monthly in the past, the total number of DOD civilians would gradually thin over time, the senior official explained.
The removal of roughly 5,400 probationary workforce employees, which DOD announced on February 21, is pending litigation.
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