What it's like to get fired from the CDC by DOGE. "It’s scary. I am a single mother of two kids."
Termination notices went out on Saturday, after painfully long hours of waiting. Legal challenges already underway.
Your federal government—the Musk-Trump attempted takeover—believes that terminating the jobs of thousands of dedicated civil servants is a wonderful thing. It is not. It’s the appearance of saving money, without assessing what we’re losing. Or as one friend put it, “losing weight by amputating a leg.”
Last week, it was rumored that a large number of probationary employees—those in their first 1-to-2 years—at the CDC and elsewhere were planned. On Saturday, termination emails went out. I’m starting to hear stories. I can’t tell them all, but I’m sharing this one because it’s a window into what is happening to thousands of people who have served this nation honorably in professions that are often unrecognized. Meanwhile, as the CDC is being weakened by President Trump, there’s a measles outbreak in Texas, a tuberculosis outbreak in Kansas (where CDC officials were deployed), and a newly reported human case of H5N1 in Wyoming requiring hospitalization in recent days.
Last week, I “met” Jamie Keller, MPH, an employee at the CDC. (This is a pseudonym, because she's hoping to get her job back and fears retribution. I also changed some small details here and there.) Jamie had read Inside Medicine recently and reached out. On Friday, she said she was expecting to receive a termination notice at some point. That finally happened on Saturday, and she wanted her story told. She’s a single mother of two, and as you will read below, she has done important work on our behalf.
It is Jamie’s hope, and mine, that shining a light on this will make people understand what is happening. The administration’s actions have real effects on real people, and they will diminish important work that keeps all of us safe. Lastly, I asked Jamie if I could organize a GoFundMe so that this community could show its support. She’s considering that. But for now, she just wants us to know what happened to her and why it matters. Here’s her story, and some receipts (scrubbed of all metadata).
But first, if you want to support work like this, please share and support Inside Medicine. Your support makes this all possible. Thank you!
CDC sends out termination emails to probationary employees—a Saturday massacre for US public health, and our safety.
On Friday evening, Jamie Keller, MPH, got a call from a supervisor at the CDC. The news was bad, but not unexpected. She was on the list of full-time employees whose jobs would be terminated without explanation—at the hands of the Trump administration’s relentless campaign to destroy decades of US public health infrastructure.
For the single mother of two, a sudden termination from a dream job that had been going well would not be easy to absorb.
Then the wait began. Actually, the wait was already underway. Jamie had been at the CDC for less than two years, making her official employment status probationary. Her two excellent annual reviews were of no import to the administration. The Office of Personnel Management, the Musk-Trump Department of Government Efficiency had decided that probationary employees were low-hanging fruit—easier to fire, or so the theory goes. (Never mind that sacking new employees would hardly be “draining the swamp.”)
Friday and Saturday were long for CDC employees like Jamie, and the administration’s cold indifference to the effects of its actions was equaled only by its apparent incompetence and disorganization. For Jamie, who was visiting her mother in assisted living due to dementia, the wait was a special kind of torture.
“We were originally told we would be notified via email between 1-4 p.m.,” she told me Friday. “But apparently they’re behind.” Later, she texted again. “Still waiting for my email. I am nearly done with my two-year probationary period,” she said, reminding me of her situation.
Then on Saturday evening, the email notification popped up on her phone (see the screenshot above). “Just got my email,” she texted me. I told her I was sorry and asked if she was okay. “I don’t even know what to say/feel,” she wrote. “It’s scary. I am a single mother of two kids." She hasn’t decided what to tell her kids, who are 8 and 5 years old.
When she opened her inbox to read her termination notice, she also found an email from another colleague she had been collaborating with who had also been terminated.
Apparently, the Trump administration has decided that fighting dangerous diseases is not a worthy activity—or more likely, is so hellbent on firing people indiscriminately, that it never stopped to consider the effects on our national safety. As an emergency physician who has diagnosed the very disease that Jamie and her colleague were working on, I emphatically disagree with this approach.
Legal issues emerge.
While rattled, Jamie struck a defiant tone. “I will for sure pursue this. I am a high performer.” CDC employees are rated on a scale of 1-5. Anything above a 3.0 is generally considered “doing your job,” and certainly not at risk for termination. Anything above the 3-range indicates exceeding expectations. In 2023, her first year at the CDC, Jamie received above a 4. In 2024, her score rose to the mid-high 4’s.
This matters because, despite DOGE’s targeting of probationary employees, the language of contracts like Jamie’s still state that job terminations must be due to inadequate performance. That was the basis of a complaint filed (by the Democracy Forward Foundation) to the Special Counsel at the Department of Justice on Friday. (To me, it was good news that a special counsel in the DOJ still exists.) In the screenshot of the email that CDC employees received above, the highlighted portion contains language that many, including Jamie, will challenge.
Not going without a fight.
Jamie does not yet have legal representation, nor was she aware of the complaint made to the DOJ until I passed it along to her. She was, however, advised by colleagues to reply to the termination email with the following language:
“Good afternoon, There appears to be a mistake in this notice, as it is cited that my knowledge, skills, and abilities, as well as my performance, are inadequate. Attached are my last two rated reviews, showing this is not the case. I have CC’d my command team as well for awareness. Please advise at your earliest convenience.”
She also said she planned to follow that up with a personal email. But first, she would have to do some last-minute archiving. She was told by colleagues that once her termination notice email was opened, she would have 15 minutes before being locked out of the system. “Luckily, we have been planning some proactively,” she said. “I have downloaded all my HR documents in the last few weeks.”
The important work of a CDC employee that Elon Musk and Donald Trump are trying to fire.
I wanted the Inside Medicine community to understand the work Jamie Keller has carried out for our nation in her work at the CDC. Initially, she gave me a much more detailed description of her and her work that I could share with you. She even considered letting use her real name. But as the weekend wore on, she became understandably more nervous. She said I could convey that she works with partners to support emergency preparedness and responses. She has worked on Covid-19, mpox, H5N1, Hurricane Helene, and the CDC’s investigation into lead contamination in applesauce.
In other words, Jamie Keller, MPH, single mother of two, has been spending her days helping various jurisdictions prevent emergencies and respond to outbreaks and other health threats in progress. Why would we want to lose dedicated professionals like Jamie Keller who tirelessly do important work on our behalf?
When I asked her how she felt about the Trump administration and its understanding of the important being work done at CDC and elsewhere, she didn’t have anything to say.
That was a marked contrast to the way she felt about her colleagues at the CDC. “I work with an amazing group of humans and I hate that that is being taken away from me.”
Afterword: If Jamie wants, I’ll update you on what happens to her in the coming days and weeks. I’ll also let you know if she decides to let us organize a GoFundMe for her. In the meantime, please share her story and others you see online. The public just does not understand the work our federal civil servants do. That’s both a problem and something we can work together to fix.
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You are brave. I am. Canadian physician who relies on your column and Kaitlyn’s daily for truthful comment and insight. In Canada , many of us are apprehensive about the Trump administration’s incoherent and impulsive policies that risk the health of Americans and all living beings. Bravo for your courage and tenacity
My small group of "activists" here prepare scripts and call our Senators each day, following up with contact form emails. We feel better doing this rather than sitting on the sidelines.