Tech Force: US Corporations Lend Their Employees to Trump

The US government is launching a campaign to recruit IT specialists under the name “US Tech Force.” The goal is to attract around 1,000 IT experts for a temporary period of two years each, who will then work for various government agencies. The hiring freeze celebrated by President Donald Trump apparently no longer applies. The search is for professionals in the fields of programming, artificial intelligence, IT security, data analysis, and IT project management.

Because the work will not be completed after two years, the recruitment program “US Tech Force” is designed for the long term. The US government has found nearly 30 IT corporations as partners. Most of them have donated directly or indirectly through their managers or shareholders to Donald Trump. They are now being given the opportunity to second their employees to the Tech Force, who will then spend two years working in various ministries.

Formally, these individuals will take two years of unpaid leave, with their stock program entitlements to be retained. After two years, they can return to their corporation. Meanwhile, the US government will pay them an annual salary of $150,000 to $200,000. This is in the same range as the salary of members of the US Parliament, who have received an unchanged $174,000 annually since 2009.

The partner corporations include Adobe, Amazon Web Services (AWS), AMD, Anduril, Apple, Box, C3.ai, Coinbase, Databricks, Dell, Docusign, Google, IBM, Meta Platforms, Microsoft, Nvidia, OpenAI, Oracle, Palantir, Salesforce, SAP, ServiceNow, Snowflake, Robinhood, Uber, Workday, and Zoom. Elon Musk's xAI is also included, and with it, his microblogging service X.

DOGE cutbacks are expensive

Under Musk's leadership, the DOGE office fired tens of thousands of public servants in the first half of the year and closed several IT departments. The US Treasury Department estimated in March that the DOGE measures would lead to a decline in tax revenues of more than ten percent. Furthermore, the ill-considered cuts at various agencies are causing additional costs.

Apparently, the work of those laid off was not always as useless as DOGE assumed. Hence the new recruitment campaign. Most positions are to be filled in Washington, DC. Since it is unlikely that a sufficient number of employees from partner companies will want to move to the swamp area, the Tech Force also accepts applications from third parties. After two years in public service, they can try to find another position in the public sector or attempt to work in the private sector. The partner corporations promise to review such applications.

DOGE was supposed to run until July 2026 but was already scrapped in November. The last update on the DOGE website dates from August.

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