USAID Contractor Abt Global Laying Off 241 Workers in MD

[Anonymous]

And so it begins. Hard times are coming. I have so many friends in federal contracting (mostly HHS contracts), and they are all worried.



https://www.bizjournals.com/washington/news/2025/02/07/abt-global-usaid-contractor-layoffs-trump-rubio.html

USAID contractor Abt Global laying off 241 workers in Maryland

Abt Global Inc. in Rockville said in a Work Adjustment and Training Notification with the Maryland Department of Labor that it is laying off 241 employees in the state, effective April 1. 

The WARN filing is dated Monday (https://labor.maryland.gov/employment/warn.shtml) and was posted to the state Department of Labor website Friday morning, a day after the Trump administration reportedly canceled 800 contracts and awards administered through USAID and told USAID officials that all but just a few hundred of the agency’s 10,000 employees worldwide would be be put on leave. 

Those moves came roughly two weeks after the administration paused all foreign aid for at least 90 days and ordered the State Department to conduct “a government-wide, comprehensive review” of how aid money is being spent...

Abt Global, whose contracts with USAID total hundreds of millions of dollars each year, is at least the fourth local federal contractor with ties to the agency to announce layoffs or furloughs in recent days (https://www.bizjournals.com/washington/news/2025/02/03/usaid-chemonics-credence-layoffs-furloughs.html). 

DAI Global in Bethesda said in a WARN filing that it furloughed nearly 400 employees (https://www.bizjournals.com/washington/news/2025/02/06/dai-global-furloughs-usaid-trump.html), while D.C.’s Chemonics International has furloughed 600 and Credence Management Solutions LLC in McLean has laid off close to 400 staffers, employees at those firms told the Business Journal’s Nate Doughty this week.

[Anonymous]

It is frustrating we all will have to suffer, even those who did not vote for this.

What are we supposed to do, be our on the streets?

[Anonymous]

So depressed reading this.

-Spouse of another USAID contractor.

[Anonymous]

Contracts are never stable. How much will all this cost in unemployment?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Contracts are never stable. How much will all this cost in unemployment?

Yes contracts are never stable. So that justifies illegally shuttering an agency in a week.leading to thousands of job losses and chaos among workers abroad. Have some humanity.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Contracts are never stable. How much will all this cost in unemployment?

Unemployment pays squat. I was laid off for a short time in VA. I made $165,000 a year and had been paying int the system for 17 years. My weekly stipend was $340.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Contracts are never stable. How much will all this cost in unemployment?

Not true. Contracts can be very stable. Until now.

[Anonymous]

According to DC Employment Services, unemployment in DC metro was 3.2% in Jan 2025 with about 2.7 million employed. Elon wants to see if he can push that unemployment number way up. Putting 10,000+ on the street in one day by shuttering US AID was a good start. Now let's see how many contractors he's put out of work.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:According to DC Employment Services, unemployment in DC metro was 3.2% in Jan 2025 with about 2.7 million employed. Elon wants to see if he can push that unemployment number way up. Putting 10,000+ on the street in one day by shuttering US AID was a good start. Now let's see how many contractors he's put out of work.

He doesn’t care. This is weaponized pain inflicted on the blue states. He’s trying to gut GSA now and can do immeasurable harm to the DMv area by relocating staff to the red states.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:According to DC Employment Services, unemployment in DC metro was 3.2% in Jan 2025 with about 2.7 million employed. Elon wants to see if he can push that unemployment number way up. Putting 10,000+ on the street in one day by shuttering US AID was a good start. Now let's see how many contractors he's put out of work.

He doesn’t care. This is weaponized pain inflicted on the blue states. He’s trying to gut GSA now and can do immeasurable harm to the DMv area by relocating staff to the red states.

I would move to Greenland before moving to a red state.

[Anonymous]

Do you think these contracts can potentially get resurrected? Or no matter what the outcome of the USAID lawsuits, these will just remained dead?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Contracts are never stable. How much will all this cost in unemployment?

Unemployment pays squat. I was laid off for a short time in VA. I made $165,000 a year and had been paying int the system for 17 years. My weekly stipend was $340.

I always thought these contributions came from the employer.

[Anonymous]

Some sad stories about usaid contractors and how being let go overnight has affected them…

https://www.nytimes.com/2025/02/09/us/politics/federal-workers-trump.html

[Anonymous]

I keep wondering if they voted for Trump. Didn't they see this coming?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Do you think these contracts can potentially get resurrected? Or no matter what the outcome of the USAID lawsuits, these will just remained dead?

I work for one of these contractors …in many cases (not just USAID contracts but those of other agencies) Musk & co are not “pausing” the work on the contracts but outright canceling them.