3 thoughts on “More Bad Space Reporting”

  1. From Tangermann for Futurism:

    As CNN reports, mass layoffs gutting three offices this year [March 10] have resulted in employees questioning the space agency’s new leadership.

    Tracking the CNN link we find this from Wattles for CNN:

    A NASA spokesperson confirmed 23 employees were let go from the agency to comply with “reduction in force,” or RIF, directives put in place by the Trump Administration and DOGE, which is operating through the Office of Personnel Management.

    Mass layoffs? The CNN article goes on to say:

    A NASA spokesperson confirmed 23 employees were let go from the agency to comply with “reduction in force,” or RIF, directives put in place by the Trump Administration and DOGE, which is operating through the Office of Personnel Management….

    The move has rankled some of the agency’s remaining staff and left some questioning how broader changes may affect the agency’s science and exploration goals.

    One senior NASA official who was among those given a layoff notice on March 10 — but who will remain an employee through April 10 — said they will not be paid for some accrued time-off awards. Two sources said the agency’s leadership would not allow at least some of the affected employees to collect bonuses they were expecting to receive this spring, nor will they be able to seek roles elsewhere in the agency. “I think we were targeted,” one source told CNN, saying that denying bonus packages “is extremely cruel and callous and needless.”

    Further down in the same CNN article:

    The layoffs announced earlier in March included NASA’s chief scientist and staff as well as the entire staff of the Office of Technology, Policy and Strategy, or OTPS, which included the agency’s chief economist and chief technologist.

    There are no plans to backfill those positions, a NASA spokesperson said in a statement to CNN.

    The layoffs also included a specific Diversity, Equity, Inclusion and Accessibility branch at agency headquarters — a group that was expected to be shuttered amid Trump’s directive to eliminate diversity-promoting programs across the federal government.

    Draw you own conclusions but always consider the Gell-Mann amnesia effect.

    1. Big time. NASA has about 18,000 employees last I heard. 23 hundred job cuts might fairly be described as “mass layoffs” but not 23. Not that NASA is undeserving of actual mass layoffs, mind you. Closing Goddard and MSFC would be a good start.

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