'Read this e-mail immediately': CDC tells about 180 fired employees to
come back to work
[March 06, 2025]
By MIKE STOBBE
NEW YORK (AP) — The nation's top public health agency says about 180
employees who were laid off two weeks ago can come back to work.
Emails went out Tuesday to some Centers for Disease Control and
Prevention probationary employees who got termination notices last
month, according to current and former CDC employees.
A message seen by the AP was sent with the subject line, “Read this
e-mail immediately.” It said that “after further review and
consideration,” a Feb. 15 termination notice has been rescinded and the
employee was cleared to return to work on Wednesday. “You should return
to duty under your previous work schedule,” it said. "We apologize for
any disruption that this may have caused."
About 180 people received reinstatement emails, according to two federal
health officials who were briefed on the tally but were not authorized
to discuss it and spoke on condition of anonymity.
It’s not clear how many of the reinstated employees returned to work
Wednesday. And it's also unclear whether the employees would be spared
from widespread job cuts that are expected soon across government
agencies.
The CDC is the latest federal agency trying to coax back workers soon
after they were dismissed as part of President Donald Trump’s and
billionaire Elon Musk’s cost-cutting purge. Similar reversals have been
made among employees responsible for medical device oversight, food
safety, bird flu response, nuclear weapons and national parks.
The Atlanta-based CDC is charged with protecting Americans from
outbreaks and other public health threats. Before the job cuts, the
agency had about 13,000 employees.
Last month, Trump administration officials told the CDC that nearly
1,300 of the agency's probationary employees would be let go. That tally
quickly changed, as the number who actually got termination notices
turned out to be 700 to 750.
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Demonstrators protest Centers for Disease Control and Prevention
(CDC) layoffs in front of the CDC headquarters in Atlanta, Feb. 18,
2025. (Arvin Temkar/Atlanta Journal-Constitution via AP, File)
 With 180 more people now being told
they can return, the actual number of CDC employees terminated so
far would seem to stand somewhere around 550. But federal health
officials haven't confirmed any specifics.
Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. last month
pledged “ radical transparency ” at the department, but HHS
officials have not provided detail about CDC staff changes and did
not respond to emailed requests on Tuesday and Wednesday. An agency
spokesman, Andrew Nixon, previously told the AP only that CDC had
more full-time employees after the job cuts than it did before the
COVID-19 pandemic.
Those who received reinstatement emails included outbreak responders
in two fellowship programs — a two-year training that prepares
recent graduates to enter the public health workforce through field
experience and a laboratory program that brings in doctorate-holding
professionals.
U.S. Sen. Raphael Warnock celebrated the reinstatements, but said
it's not enough.
“Today’s announcement is a welcome relief, but until all fired CDC
employees are restored, our country’s public health and national
security will continue to be at risk,” Warnock, a Georgia Democrat,
said in a statement Wednesday.
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Associated Press writer Michelle R. Smith in Providence, Rhode
Island, contributed to this report.
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