White House makes weekly work reports mandatory, Musk clarifies rule for sensitive roles

Federal employees across multiple agencies must now submit weekly work reports, as mandated by the White House.

Federal employees across multiple government agencies are once again being directed to submit weekly reports detailing their work accomplishments, CNN reported, citing union sources and several employees who received the directives.

The emails, titled “What did you do last week? Part II,” were sent out Friday evening to staff at agencies including the Bureau of Prisons, General Services Administration, Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, Office of Personnel Management (OPM), Social Security Administration, and the Departments of Education and Veterans Affairs, among others, as per CNN's review of these emails.

According to the report, employees are required to submit five bullet points summarising their weekly achievements and copy their managers. Unlike the previous directive, this reporting will now be a weekly requirement, with a deadline of 11:59 p.m. ET on Mondays.

Clarifying the directive, Elon Musk stated, “The President has made it clear that this is mandatory for the executive branch. Anyone working on classified or other sensitive matters is still required to respond if they receive the email, but can simply reply that their work is sensitive.”

The President has made it clear that this is mandatory for the executive branch.
Anyone working on classified or other sensitive matters is still required to respond if they receive the email, but can simply reply that their work is sensitive. https://t.co/lSyfj8eMzR Elon Musk (@elonmusk) March 1, 2025

Pentagon employees also directed to comply

On Friday, Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth issued a separate directive mandating that all Pentagon civilian employees comply with a similar requirement. According to a memo obtained by CNN, employees will receive an email on Monday requesting their five key accomplishments from the previous week. The memo also clarifies that responses will remain internal to the Department of Defense (DoD), rather than being sent to OPM.

Wider confusion over reporting mandate

The new requirement follows an earlier mass email sent without warning to over two million federal workers last Saturday, shortly after Elon Musk posted on X, stating that employees must account for their work or risk being considered for resignation. The original email, sent from OPM, did not contain any termination threats but caused widespread confusion.

Consistent with President @realDonaldTrumps instructions, all federal employees will shortly receive an email requesting to understand what they got done last week.Failure to respond will be taken as a resignation. Elon Musk (@elonmusk) February 22, 2025

As a result, agencies responded differently:

The FBI and Departments of Defense, State, Homeland Security, and Energy advised employees not to respond.
Other agencies stated that responding was voluntary.
Some agencies mandated compliance.
Just hours before the deadline, OPM clarified that responding to the initial email was voluntary. However, according to the White House, one million federal employees complied and submitted their reports.

Musk and Trump weigh in 

Speaking at President Donald Trump’s first Cabinet meeting of his second term on Wednesday, Elon Musk defended the directive, calling it a “pulse check review.”

"We think there are a number of people on the government payroll who are dead. Which is probably why they can’t respond. And some people who are not real people, like they’re literally fictional individuals that are collecting paychecks," Musk said.

"So we’re literally trying to figure out, are these people real, are they alive and can they write an email?"

Trump, however, took a more hardline stance, signaling that noncompliance could lead to job losses.

"Those million people that haven’t responded to Elon, they are on the bubble," Trump said.

"Maybe they’re going to be gone, maybe they’re not around, maybe they have other jobs, maybe they moved, and they’re not where they’re supposed to be."