COLORADO SPRINGS — NASA is developing options for restructuring and potentially downsizing the agency, with the final decisions to be left to the agency’s next leader.
In an interview during the 40th Space Symposium April 7, NASA Acting Administrator Janet Petro acknowledged that it is an “unsettling” time for the agency’s workforce, as well as across the federal government, as the Trump administration seeks to make sweeping changes that include large-scale reductions in force (RIFs) or layoffs.
NASA is currently working on what Petro calls a “workforce optimization” plan, also known as the Agency RIF and Reorganization Plan. The agency submitted phase one of that plan last month and is working on phase two, due to the administration in about two weeks.
The plan will include options for restructuring NASA, but Petro did not go into details. “We are going to be different as we’re looking at how do we want to optimize our organization so that maybe we operate a little bit more efficiently and effectively,” she said.
That plan, she said, would provide options that Jared Isaacman, the White House’s nominee to be NASA administrator, can select and implement once he is confirmed. “From my perspective, I want to put together some options for when Jared gets confirmed,” she said. “I don’t want to make choices before he gets here, where he might want to do things a little bit differently.”
“It’s all about efficiency,” she said of those plans. “How can we organize differently? How can we increase our decision velocity? How can we flatten the organization to be more responsive and efficient?”
She acknowledged those changes are worrying at least some at the agency, who wonder if they may still be employed in the coming months. “I’m certain it is very unsettling for people who have worked for the federal government for 20 or 30 years and have never seen this sort of thing happen.”
Petro said one concern is keeping employees focused on agency missions amid these changes. NASA lost about 5% of its workforce in the deferred resignation initiative. “There were holes in several of our programs that we had to fill,” she said. “Filling back in those holes has been a challenge in many areas, and it is a distraction to people.”
She defended the decision in March to shutter three offices at NASA Headquarters, including the Office of the Chief Scientist and the Office of Technology, Policy, and Strategy as well as a part of the Office of Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion. Closing those offices resulted in laying off 23 people.
“We looked at it and those three offices stuck out as not really having a long-term, enduring position within this administration,” she said. “In terms of efficiency, we wanted to go ahead and take those staff offices off the table,” calling them “low-hanging fruit that we wanted to go ahead and move out on.”
Some have criticized those layoffs, noting that affected employees were given only 30 days notice instead of 60 days, and also not given an opportunity to move into other open positions in the agency. Petro defended that move, stating that providing 30 days notice “was enough.”
“I don’t think we are going to have any open hiring for a while,” she added, other than some “targeted positions” for critical skills.
Another area of uncertainty is the agency’s budget. Petro said she has not received any information on the administration’s plans for its fiscal year 2026 budget proposal, other than “rumors from really not credible sources.”
There had been widespread speculation that the budget proposal will seek a major cut in NASA science programs in particular, potentially as large as 50%. At a congressional roundtable at Space Symposium April 6, attended by Petro, Rep. George Whitesides (D-Calif.) said he had learned that Earth science missions in formulation or in extended mission has been told to work on termination plans as a contingency.
“We have confirmed that nobody has actually reached out and told us any of the things that he said” about preparing termination plans, she said, calling his comments “a surprise to all of us.”
Petro said that she has talked informally with Isaacman and sat in on briefings that some mission directorates have had with him to discuss their activities. Isaacman, meanwhile, has been preparing for winning Senate confirmation to become administrator, with a hearing on his nomination by the Senate Commerce Committee scheduled for April 9.
Petro said Isaacman has not been involved in the development of the restructuring plans that he will be charged with implementing. “He knows nothing about them. I don’t think he wants to know,” she said. “I think he’s just focusing on his upcoming hearing.”
