Department of the Interior

Two DOGE staffers – Tyler Hassen and Bryton Shang – show up an Army Corp of Engineers dam in California and attempt to turn on water pumps to drain more wate one of California’s reservoirs to help fight fires in LA. This dam fed water to central California, far away from the LA wildfires the water was supposed to help.

Tyler Hassen conducts a review of every single contract and grant from DOI and sends action items for review directly to Secretary Burgum.

Stephanie Holmes requests full admin access to the Federal Personnel Payroll System (FPPS) system to process actions for herself as well as DOGE members Katrine Trampe and Tyler Hassen. This is a shared service provided by DOI which handles payroll for approximately half of the federal government.

Stephanie Holmes’ request for admin access to the FPPS system is approved Senior Advisor to the Secretary of the Interior, Jarrod Agen.

DOGE boasts in a tweet that 27% more water was released by the Bureau of Reclamation in February compared to January (unclear if this adjusts for different lengths of months).

After being provided with access to FPPS, Stephanie Holmes raises concerns to DOI leadership that she has not yet been granted full admin access to FPPS. The agency CIO is concerned enough about the security implications that he will only allow it if the Secretary of the Interior signs off on a memo outlining the risks. Stephanie Holmes refuses to convey the message to Secretary Burgum.

Tyler Hassen places the CIO and CISO at the Department of the Interior on admininstrative leave under investigation for raising alarm about DOGE’s access and delaying Stephanie Holmes from having admin access to the FPPS system.

After the CIO and CISO are sidelined, Gavin Kliger joins a call with Katrine Trampe to pressure a senior advisor in human resources at DOI to direct them to the system owner for FPPS.

Stephanie Holmes and Katrine Trampe are given full admin access to the Federal Personnel Payroll System (FPPS) which handles the payroll processing for approximately half of the federal government.

The manager of the DOI’s labor relations branch initiates an investigation of the DOI’s CIO, Deputy CIO, Associate Solicitor and a Special Advisor to HR over their attempts to prevent DOGE from having admin access to FPPS.

The Washington Posts reports that both Tyler Hassen and Matt Luby are scrutinizing all grants at the Department of the Interior. They also requested a list of all grants going to Maine, perhaps to punish the state for its governor’s defiance of Trump.

The Secretary of the Interior formally designates that Tyler Hassen is in charge of implementing cuts to the agency and reorganizing its offices and areas of responsibility.

Stephanie Holmes, in her role as acting chief human capital officers, sends an email ordering DOI staff to stop by May 28 from doing any detail work they were doing to cover for DOGE staffing cuts at the agency.

DOI extends its freeze on issuing any new regulations out to June 4th.

A spreadsheet created by Conor Fennessy outlines a reported $26 million in grant reductions for programs in the National Parks, including those identified as “DEI” or studying climate change. It also axes a popular Scientists in Parks program, that provides educational opportunities for early-career scientists and students. A $400K project to make a park accessible for children with disabilities was also targeted because it was “DEI.”

After Politico published a report that included an email from a 30-year veteran of the Bureau of Land Management which told staff to ignore instructions from Stephanie Holmes that they weren’t allow to sub in for empty roles, he is escorted out of the building by security.

An article in the New York Times reports that both Tyler Hassen and Stephanie Holmes are still active at the DOI.

Ranking Democrats on the House Natural Resources Committee send a letter expressing concern and urging the Secretary of the Department of the Interior to immediately revoke DOGE’s access to the FPPS system that handles payroll for large parts of the US government.

Despite announcing that he would be leaving the agency on August 1st, Tyler Hassen is still reportedly working at the Department of the Interior. It is unclear what his title is and where his work is focused, but he is still there.

Democrats on the House Committe on Natural Resources send a letter to the Secretary of the Interior requesting information about the activities of Tyler Hassen at the agency including his financial disclosure forms, communications with the ethics office and daily calendar.

A day after receiving the letter from House Democrats, the Secretary of the Interior amends his prior order naming Tyler Hassen to the position of Principal Deputy Assistant Secretary to instead be filled by another person at the agency not affiliated with DOGE. It’s unclear if this means that Tyler Hassen is out of the agency or is just in a different role.

The Department of Interior is reportedly planning another round of layoffs for mid-October. This follows the loss of 7500 employees (nearly 11% of its workforce) already. The agency is reported to be using the AutoRIF software developed at OPM to run the process, and it is being run by Stephanie Holmes and Tyler Hassen, who did not leave the agency in August as previously reported.