After Crash, Trump Administration Tells FAA Staffers To Quit and Enjoy ‘Dream Destination’ Vacation

Just hours after President Trump blamed diversity initiatives at the Federal Aviation Administration for the deadly plane crash above the Potomac River, FAA employees, including air traffic controllers, received an email asking them to quit their jobs, according to a report. The email, which was sent out to hundreds of thousands of federal employees as part of Mr. Trump’s push to remove many civil servants from their positions arrived in their email boxes at 8:30 p.m. – 24 hours after an Army Blackhawk helicopter crashed into an American Airlines passenger jet making its descent into Reagan National Airport at Washington, DC.“We encourage you to find a job in the private sector as soon as you would like to do so,” reads the e-mail from the Office of Personnel Management, according to a report by the New York Times. “The way to greater American prosperity is encouraging people to move from lower productivity jobs in the public sector to higher productivity jobs in the private sector.”The timing of the email comes as Mr. Trump has placed scrutiny on the FAA and DEI hiring initiatives put in place at the agency as a possible cause for the deadly crash, killing 67, over Washington on Wednesday evening.In his first press conference from the White House briefing room since winning a second term, the president cast blame on diversity programs and previous Democratic administrations.“The FAA is actively recruiting workers who suffer severe intellectual disabilities, psychiatric problems, and other mental and physical conditions under a diversity and inclusion hiring initiative spelled out on the agency’s website,” Mr. Trump said. “They have to be talented, naturally talented geniuses. You can’t have regular people doing their job.”Mr. Trump offered no evidence to back up his claims about DEI being responsible for the tragedy. “How can you come to the conclusion right now that diversity had something to do with this crash,” a reporter in the briefing room asked of Mr. Trump.“Because I have common sense, okay,” the president replied.On Friday while speaking to reporters in the Oval Office the president was asked if he had any concerns that his comments would interfere with the investigation into the crash.“No, I think they’ll do an investigation. It’ll probably come out the way I said it. I’d like to put it up front,” he said.The email letter, which was formatted as a “frequently asked questions” message, says employees can immediately get a second job or head to their “dream destination” for a vacation while living off a severance package.The “FAQ” email was a follow up to a previous email sent to federal staffers at the FAA and multiple federal agencies that offered a buyout of about eight months pay if they agreed to leave their positions by February 6.Other agencies whose employees received the buyout offers from OPM include the United States Department of Agriculture, The Department of Veterans Affairs, the Environmental Protection Agency, and The Department of Justice. A total of 2 million federal employees have received the series of emails.

After Crash, Trump Administration Tells FAA Staffers To Quit and Enjoy ‘Dream Destination’ Vacation

More from the New York Sun

‘The Trembling Hand’ Provocatively Calls Out the Romantic Poets for Perpetuating Racist Tropes

Iran and Vietnam

No Más, Trump Tells Spain

More from the New York Sun

‘The Trembling Hand’ Provocatively Calls Out the Romantic Poets for Perpetuating Racist Tropes

Iran and Vietnam

No Más, Trump Tells Spain

‘The Revenant’ Re-Release Is a Potent Reminder of What Hollywood Has Lost in the Past Decade

Will the Late Iranian Supreme Leader’s Son Succeed Him?

Trump Acted When He Had To Act

Parents’ Rights in Childrearing Advance in California

With Feuding Gulf Countries Uniting Against Iran, Is an Alliance With Israel in the Cards Next?