CDC rehires 450 employees cut in HHS restructuring, internal documents show
The government on Wednesday hired back more than 450 Centers for Disease Control and Prevention employees that were fired as part of the widespread restructuring that took place in April at the Department of Health and Human Services, internal documents shared with ABC News show.
Among the branches that were reinstated was the National Center for Environmental Health, which oversees a lead prevention program for children across the country that ABC News has reported on extensively and asked HHS Sec. Robert F. Kennedy Jr. about directly.
The cuts to the branch had left more than a half dozen schools in Milwaukee without federal assistance as they dealt with hazardous levels of lead in their building.
More than 120 people were rehired to the CDC division, which also monitors other environmental toxins, including wildfire smoke and radiation exposure.
"It's like Dunkirk when many civilian hands helped save the army. Glad to be on the other side," NCEH Division Director Erik Svendsen told ABC News after finding out.
It's unclear what prompted the employees to be rehired. In the original cuts HHS announced in late March, the CDC's workforce decreased by approximately 2,400 employees. Officials have previously said any rehiring would come with additional firings to even out the numbers.
Kennedy attended a showing of "Les Miserables" with President Donald Trump and other administration officials at the Kennedy Center on Wednesday night, shortly after news broke about the CDC reinstatements. Stopping to speak to the media on the red carpet before the show, Kennedy declined to answer questions from ABC News about why HHS reversed course on the CDC employees' terminations.
Lawsuits against HHS's rampant firing, which impacted around 10,000 employees across the CDC, Food and Drug Administration and National Institutes of Health, continue to play out.
In a statement on Wednesday confirming the reinstatements, an HHS spokesperson said, "Under Secretary Kennedy's leadership, the nation's critical public health functions remain intact and effective."
"The Trump Administration is committed to protecting essential services -- whether it's supporting coal miners and firefighters through NIOSH, safeguarding public health through lead prevention, or researching and tracking the most prevalent communicable diseases," the spokesperson said, listing programs that were cut and then later reinstated after public and political pressure to do so.
The chaotic dismissal of experts across the agency has prompted outcry from the science community and questions from a number of Republicans, especially as their states were impacted by cut programs. Programs like the National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health, which monitors coal mine safety, saw reinstatements.
Other branches reinstated Wednesday include the National Center for HIV, Viral Hepatitis, STD, and Tuberculosis Prevention, which works to track and prevent infectious diseases that affect millions of Americans and cause tens of thousands of deaths annually. The CDC's global health division, which has foreign offices in about 60 countries to monitor for health or security threats overseas, is also set to regain about two dozen employees.
