US National Security Agency cuts its workforce by 2,000 people

The US National Security Agency recently fulfilled a goal to shed around 2,000 employees, according to three people familiar with the spy agency, Report informs referring to Defense One.

The purge reflects months-long pressure by the second Trump administration to shrink the federal government and clean out alleged bloat and politicization in the intelligence community. Employees at the nation"s various spy agencies were initially extended deferred-resignation offers in February, and in May, news broke of the downsizing goals for the intel community and NSA specifically.

As in other federal agencies, some workers were fired, others quit, and still others accepted the deferred-resignation deals, under which they left government service early but were paid for several more months.

It's not clear what percentage of NSA's employees have left. The size of the agency's workforce is classified; agency officials have said this helps conceal US intelligence capabilities from foreign adversaries. But a fact sheet published last year by the state of Maryland put the agency"s workforce at 39,000.