Virginia Gov. Glenn Youngkin (R) said on Monday that he has empathy for the state’s federal workers at risk of losing their jobs as a result of the Trump administration’s efforts to cut down the size of the federal government under the Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE).
Youngkin made the remarks during a press conference in McLean, where he announced the state’s “Virginia Has Jobs” initiative. In additional to promoting 250,000 open jobs in the state, Youngkin also said a “support resource bundle” would be available to federal workers looking for work.
“I understand and I actually have extraordinary empathy for the fact that there are many workers in Virginia today from our federal workforce who are experiencing real concerns,” Youngkin said at a press conference in Northern Virginia highlighting new economic opportunities in the state.
“Listen, we have a federal government that is inefficient and we have an administration that is taking on that challenge of rooting our waste, fraud, and abuse,” he continued.
“I would suggest that our federal workforce is not at fault here but the reality is any CEO who steps into a position where there is an organization that has such deep financial challenges is going to have to make change and therefore I recognize that this change will impact Virginians. We have a lot of federal workers in the commonwealth,” he said.
Roughly 145,000 federal employees live in Virginia, along with large swaths of government contractors.
Virginia Democrats have seized on how DOGE efforts could negatively impact the state’s federal workforce and by extension the state’s economy.