“When there are excellent tools available, it is GSA’s responsibility to procure them rather than create mediocre alternatives,” a colleague commented.
“Did you employ this AI to manage the [reduction in force]?” inquired another federal employee.
“When will Adobe Pro be restored to us?” asked yet another. “This is an essential program we rely on daily. Please return it or at least provide us with a timeline for its return.”
Employees also expressed their concerns regarding the mandate to return to the office. “What’s the rationale behind [return to office] enhancing collaboration when none of our clients, contractors, or members of our [integrated product teams] will be in the same workplace?” a GSA worker questioned. “We’ll continue to conduct all our work through email or Google meetings.”
One staff member queried Ehikian about the identity of the DOGE team at GSA. “There is no DOGE team at GSA,” Ehikian responded, according to two employees who were present. Many employees, who claim to have seen DOGE staff at GSA, were skeptical. “Like we didn’t notice a group of young individuals working behind a secure area on the 6th floor,” one employee remarked to WIRED. Luke Farritor, a young former intern from SpaceX who has been with DOGE since its inception, was spotted wearing sunglasses indoors at the GSA office recently, as was Ethan Shaotran, another young DOGE worker who recently held the presidency of the Harvard mountaineering club. A GSA employee characterized Shaotran as “smiling in a blazer and t-shirt.”
GSA did not immediately reply to a request for commentary sent by WIRED.
During the meeting, Ehikian presented a slide outlining GSA’s objectives—right-sizing, streamlining operations, deregulation, and IT innovation—along with current cost savings. “Overall costs avoided” were reported at $1.84 billion. The number of employees utilizing generative AI tools created by GSA was cited as 1,383. The hours saved through automation were stated to be 178,352. Ehikian also highlighted that the agency has canceled or reduced 35,354 credit cards used by government employees and terminated 683 leases. (WIRED cannot verify any of these figures. DOGE has previously been known to circulate misleading and erroneous statistics regarding its cost-saving initiatives.)
“Any efficiency assessment requires a denominator,” a GSA employee noted in the chat. “Cuts may lower expenses, but they can also diminish the value delivered to the public. How does that get reflected in the scorecard?”
In a slide labeled “The Road Ahead,” Ehikian outlined his vision for the future. “Optimize federal real estate portfolio,” mentioned one objective. “Centralize procurement,” stated another. Subcategories included “reduce compliance burden to increase competition,” “centralize our data for accessibility across teams,” and “Optimize GSA’s cloud and software expenditures.”
Online, employees appeared skeptical. “So, will Stephen refrain from working on any federal contracts following his term as GSA administrator, particularly concerning AI and IT software?” posed one employee in the chat. There was no response.
