Trump team axes most US Institute of Peace staff

The administration of US President Donald Trump has fired almost all employees at the headquarters of the US Institute of Peace (USIP) as part of its campaign to reduce the size of government, led by Elon Musk’s Department of Government Efficiency.

The development was reported by several news outlets on Saturday and later confirmed by the White House.

USIP was founded by Congress in the mid-1980s with the declared goal of promoting conflict resolution worldwide. Trump signed an executive order targeting the institute last month, followed by the firing of most of the organization’s board in mid-March.

According to media reports, 200 to 300 people at USIP’s headquarters in Washington received termination letters from the Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) late Friday.

According to the Washington Post, the affected employees called the sudden firings “the Friday night massacre.”

Staff members who spoke to the media on condition of anonymity said they were offered severance pay and one additional month of health insurance in exchange for waiving their rights to sue the administration over their firing. Those who refused were told they would lose all their benefits as of Monday, the sources said.

The move reportedly does not affect the institute’s 600 employees overseas, who remain in their positions for now.

Earlier this month, members of USIP’s board filed a lawsuit against DOGE, Trump, and members of his administration, claiming that the executive branch has no authority to fire the organization’s employees because it was set up by Congress. Hearings in the case are scheduled to take place in late April.

Asked by CNN to comment on the firings at USIP, White House spokeswoman Anna Kelly said, “taxpayers do not want to spend $50 million per year on a publicly-funded ‘research institute’ that has failed to deliver peace.”

“President Trump ended the era of forever wars and established peace in his first term, and he is carrying out his mandate to eliminate bloat and save taxpayer dollars,” she added.