A senior official in the department said that the programs being cut are not those that require congressional approval.
The State Department will reportedly close 132 offices and eliminate 700 jobs as part of a restructuring and reorganization effort.
The reported closures would equal about 17% of the agency. Officials told the Free Press that it is the biggest shake-up at the department “in decades.”
In the effort led by Secretary of State Marco Rubio, with the help of the Trump administration’s Department of Government Efficiency, agency undersecretaries have been instructed to reduce their personnel by 15% within 30 days.
On Tuesday, 12 top agency officials were briefed on the plans, and a letter was sent to Congress informing lawmakers of the upcoming changes, according to the Free Press.
“In its current form, the Department is bloated, bureaucratic and unable to perform its essential diplomatic mission in this new era of great power competition,” Rubio told The Free Press. “That is why today I am announcing a comprehensive reorganization plan that will bring the Department into the 21st Century.”
In addition to eliminating the offices and jobs, another 137 offices are slated for consolidation and will be transferred to a single location.
Lets go congress, do what we elected you to do. Help us out, save us some money. The hard work of finding the waste has been done for you.