Washington, D.C

Trump’s federal layoffs could mean bleak outlook for Washington DC

Published

9 months ago

February 20, 2025

Trump’s federal layoffs could mean bleak outlook for Washington DC

The Trump administration’s sweeping layoffs of federal employees already appear to be pushing up joblessness in Washington, D.C., and an economist projects they’ll tip the city into a recession this year.

The developments are rocking an area of the country that traditionally has served as a bastion of steady employment and economic stability through slowdowns or downturns that have roiled other parts of the country.

Nationally, layoffs have remained historically low and forecasters expect solid economic growth this year with little chance of recession.

In the week ending Feb. 15, 1,695 Washington, D.C., workers applied for unemployment insurance for the first time, up slightly from 1,682 the previous week and 619 during the comparable week a year ago, according to the Labor Department’s non-seasonally adjusted figures.

During the four weeks since Trump took office, 5,455 District of Columbia employees filed initial jobless claims – a reliable gauge of layoffs – up sharply from 2,014 in the same period in early 2024. It’s not clear what portion of those are government workers.

But nationally, excluding D.C., the number of Americans seeking jobless benefits through the first four weeks of both this year and in 2024 has totaled about 920,000 on a non-seasonally adjusted basis, highlighting an unusual surge in the district.

Last week, a seasonally adjusted 219,000 Americans across the U.S. filed initial claims, up from 214,000 the previous week and underscoring that, overall, layoffs remain low.

Do federal government employees get laid off?

So far, the Trump administration has fired more than 10,000 workers at the departments of Energy, Agriculture, Interior, Health and Human Services and Veterans Affairs as well as at the Internal Revenue Service and the Environmental Protection Agency, among other agencies.

The layoffs come on top of about 75,000 workers who have taken buyouts offered by Trump and White House aide Elon Musk, who have said they’re looking to slash government costs and improve efficiency.

Are all federal employees on probation getting fired?

Administration officials have indicated the cuts would include employees still in their probationary periods as well as others. About 220,000 government employees had less than a year of experience as of March 2024, according to the Office of Personnel Management.

The layoffs mark the beginning of “large-scale reductions” in the federal workforce, according to an executive order signed by Trump.

Ultimately, about 400,000 federal workers likely will lose their jobs over the next two years, or about 15% of the 2.4 million members of the federal workforce, estimates Adam Kamins, regional economist at Moody’s Analytics. Many of the targeted positions, he said, will be scattered across the country, slightly slowing growth nationally, but an outsized share – nearly 100,000 – will be in Washington. The nation’s capital is home to slightly less than a fifth of the federal workforce, according to Pew Research.

What is a recession in simple terms?

The job cuts are expected to push D.C. into a mild recession, or declining economic output, that lasts from the second quarter of this year to the third quarter of 2026, Kamins said. He predicts the city’s unemployment rate will rise from its current 5.5% to a peak of 6.5% in mid-2026 and its gross domestic product will contract for six straight quarters.

Nationally, forecasters expect the economy to grow a solid 2.2% this year and put recession odds at just 25%, according to those surveyed this month by Wolters Kluwer Blue Chip Economic Indicators.

“This is a very unusual situation for D.C.,” Kamins said. “It typically is one of the least” vulnerable cities to the ups and downs of economic cycles as a result of stable government jobs that don’t depend on the vagaries of consumer demand.

In fact, under normal circumstances, if Trump’s widening trade war with other countries were to cause a U.S. recession in the next year or two, Washington government jobs could have been viewed as landing spots for laid-off private-sector workers, Kamins said.

The projected 100,000 federal job cuts will also likely mean thousands more additional job losses as restaurants, retailers and other D.C. businesses that rely on sales to federal workers scale back, Kamins said. That could mean new strains for lower-income residents who work in those occupations. The district’s poverty rate was 14% in 2023, compared to 11.1% for the nation, according to Statista and the U.S. Census Bureau.

“A lot of folks are close to the poverty line,” Kamins said. “It’s just going to exacerbate their situation.”

As employees who work in D.C. but live in Virginia and Maryland receive layoff notices, many will likely reduce their spending, slowing growth in those states but stopping short of nudging the areas into a downturn, Kamins said.

How is the US job market right now?

Meanwhile, government workers who lose their jobs are expected to enter a cooling labor market with fewer opportunities. Many specialize in administration, project management or information technology and there are now relatively few private-sector openings in those fields, said Julia Pollak, chief economist of ZipRecruiter, a leading job search site.

“This will be very difficult for many of them,” she said.

Professional business services, a sprawling sector populated with 22.7 million lawyers, consultants, office managers and other white-collar workers, has shed 69,000 jobs over the past year, Labor Department figures show.

What career is most in demand right now?

At the same time, employers are struggling to find finance specialists, cybersecurity workers and administrative health care professionals, Pollak said. Federal workers in those fields, she said, could find plenty of job vacancies at higher wages.

Many federal employees will likely have to leave the region to find work, Kamins said, with some pivoting to new occupations. If a new administration seeks to restore the scuttled jobs in four years, it may be difficult to find employees, he said.

Pollak is more sanguine.

“There are many people who want to serve in the federal government,” she said.

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Washington, D.C

Teenager shot and killed in Southeast DC, possibly for his jacket

Published

15 hours ago

November 13, 2025

Press Room

Teenager shot and killed in Southeast DC, possibly for his jacket

Tristan Johnson, 17, was a young man with plans — and the energy and determination to make them come true — says his godfather, Davian Morgan.

“When I’d talk to him about future plans, he’d be like, ‘Well, you know, starting a vending machine business or like owning my own trucking company,’” said Davian Morgan, Tristan’s godfather.

Pictures from Tristan’s life — his years at Ingenuity Prep in the District, then at Dr. Henry A. Wise High School in Prince George’s County — fill Morgan’s phone.

“He was very outgoing,” Morgan said. “So even if you didn’t know him, you knew of him, and he was eventually going to find his way to introduce you to himself.

Family members know Tristan was with some friends around 3 p.m. Saturday when he was shot and killed in the 1900 block of C Street SE, not far from the Stadium Armory Metro Station.

D.C. police sources familiar with the investigation say the suspects may have been attempting to rob the 17-year-old of his jacket.

As his family grieves the sudden, horrifying loss, they are finding some comfort from the outpouring of love from his many friends.

“At least 20 of my previous students found my number some way, somehow and they were like, ‘Are you okay? We’re just checking in to see if you’re okay. We’re praying for you,’” Morgan said. “And in my mind, I should be saying this to you

In his grief, Morgan says he has wondered about those thousands of federal officers and National Guard troops deployed to fight crime in the District.

“I think that is probably one of the questions right now that his mother is asking herself over and over and over again,” Morgan said. “Of all the places for it to happen, in broad daylight.”

Tristan was fatally shot just one block from the D.C. Armory, a hub of operations for the estimated two thousand National Guard troops deployed to the nation’s capital to fight crime.

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Washington, D.C

Barack Obama surprises veterans on honor flight to DC ahead of Veterans Day

Published

2 days ago

November 11, 2025

Press Room

Barack Obama surprises veterans on honor flight to DC ahead of Veterans Day

article

Former U.S. President Barack Obama greets veterans exiting a plane at Ronald Reagan Washington National Airport on Saturday, Nov. 8, 2025. (Credit: Barack Obama via Facebook)

WASHINGTON – Former President Barack Obama surprised a group of veterans who flew into D.C. over the weekend ahead of Veterans Day.

Obama surprises veterans

What we know:

A group of veterans of the Vietnam and Korean wars flew into Ronald Reagan Washington National Airport on Saturday, as part of an honor flight from Wisconsin. The veterans were visiting their memorials ahead of Veterans Day on Tuesday.

“When you come to greet our Honor Flight Veterans at DCA, you never know who might be there. On Saturday, our Veterans from Badger Honor Flight were surprised when Barack Obama showed up to greet them when they arrived at DCA,” said a post on the Honor Flight Facebook page on Saturday. “He boarded the plane after it landed and addressed the group, then shook every hand and presented each with a presidential challenge coin!”

Obama shared video of the moment on his own Facebook page on Tuesday, showing him greeting the veterans as they got off the plane, and the large crowd of people greeting them as they walked into the terminal.

SUGGESTED: Veterans Day 2025 deals: Where Veterans can get free meals and discounts

What they’re saying:

“Ahead of Veterans Day, I was honored to welcome a flight of veterans and their families as they arrived in DC,” the former president wrote. “To all those who bravely served our country, thank you to you and your family for your extraordinary service. The sacrifices that all of you have made to protect our country will be honored, today and every day.”

What is an Honor Flight?

Dig deeper:

Honor Flight DCA is a volunteer organization that flies veterans to Washington from over 100 hubs across the U.S. The organization brings the veterans to D.C. to visit the memorials for the wars they fought in, free of charge.

The group has flown approximately 300,000 veterans to D.C. over the last 20 years, according to their website.

What’s next:

The Honor Flight organization has one more flight scheduled in 2025, with a group from Austin arriving at DCA on Dec. 6.

The Source: Information in this story is from the Honor Flight At Reagan Facebook page and website and Barack Obama’s Facebook page.

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Washington, D.C

Deployment of West Virginia National Guard members in nation’s capital can continue, judge rules

Published

3 days ago

November 10, 2025

Press Room

Deployment of West Virginia National Guard members in nation’s capital can continue, judge rules

A judge on Monday allowed the continued deployment of more than 300 West Virginia National Guard members to patrol the streets of Washington, D.C., as part of President Donald Trump’s push to send the military into Democratic-run cities.

Kanawha County Circuit Judge Richard D. Lindsay made the ruling after hearing arguments in a lawsuit by a civic organization that argued Republican Gov. Patrick Morrisey exceeded his authority when he authorized the Guard’s deployment in August.

West Virginia is among several states that sent National Guard members to the nation’s capital. While the state National Guard has said its deployment could last until the end of November, it is consulting with the governor’s office and others on the possibility of extending the stay.

READ MORE: While wary of Trump’s motives, some D.C. residents uneasily back parts of the National Guard deployment

Formal orders were issued last week extending the deployment of the District of Columbia’s National Guard in the city through the end of February.

“We are pleased with the judge’s decision,” Jace Goins, the state’s chief deputy attorney general, said outside the court in Charleston. “The National Guard are going nowhere. They’re staying in D.C. They’re not going to be redeployed to West Virginia.

“The judge made the determination that the governor made a lawful decision deploying the National Guard to D.C. by a lawful request of the president.”

The West Virginia Citizen Action Group, which filed the lawsuit, argued that under state law the governor could deploy the National Guard out of state only for certain purposes, such as responding to a natural disaster or another state’s emergency request.

The civic group claimed that it was harmed by the deployment by being forced to refocus its resources away from government accountability and transparency. The state attorney general’s office sought to reject the case, saying the group has not been harmed and lacked standing to challenge Morrisey’s decision.

“It was a simple issue of a broad, lawful request by the president and a lawful deployment by the governor. That’s all,” Goins said.

Aubrey Sparks, an attorney for the American Civil Liberties Union’s West Virginia chapter, said she didn’t believe it was the correct decision.

“I think that West Virginia law is clear,” Sparks said. “I think what the state was permitted to do here is to skirt past West Virginia law simply because Trump asked them to. And that’s not how the law works. We remain deeply concerned about it.”

Trump issued an executive order in August declaring a crime emergency in the nation’s capital, although the Department of Justice itself says violent crime there is at a 30-year low.

Within a month, more than 2,300 Guard troops from eight states and the District of Columbia were patrolling under the Army secretary’s command. Trump also deployed hundreds of federal agents to assist them.

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