The U.S. State Department has declined offers from benched State Department officials to help with Iran war-related evacuation efforts, according to the State Department’s union and an email seen by Foreign Policy.
Around 250 diplomats were laid off under a so-called reduction-in-force (RIF) order last year but have not yet officially separated from the department and are still on the payroll, John Dinkelman, president of the American Foreign Service Association, told Foreign Policy.
The U.S. State Department has declined offers from benched State Department officials to help with Iran war-related evacuation efforts, according to the State Department’s union and an email seen by Foreign Policy.
Around 250 diplomats were laid off under a so-called reduction-in-force (RIF) order last year but have not yet officially separated from the department and are still on the payroll, John Dinkelman, president of the American Foreign Service Association, told Foreign Policy.
A State Department officer who fell under the RIF and volunteered to return to help confirmed that they were still on the payroll, as did a foreign service officer close to the union effort to challenge the RIF. They were granted anonymity as they were not permitted to speak to the press.
“Many members of the RIF cohort have been moved to volunteer to use their foreign language, regional expertise, and consular experience to assist in [the Middle East evacuation] effort,” Dinkelman wrote to Michael Rigas, State Department deputy secretary for management and resources, according to the letter shared with Foreign Policy.
“We have the potential to be of enormous value to the Department of State as it seeks to fulfill its highest goal – the protection of American citizens,” he wrote.
The laid-off employees include those with consular, crisis management, and regional experience, Dinkelman told Foreign Policy. “They’ve all been on the phones, with many of them having evacuated thousands of Americans already [in past crises],” he said.
However, the State Department has so far declined the assistance, according to the letter sent by Dinkelman.
“Hundreds of experienced personnel are working on the task force, which is fully staffed,” State Department principal deputy spokesperson Tommy Pigott said in a statement to Foreign Policy. “Hundreds more are proactively making calls to Americans with specific travel options. There is currently no wait time for Americans reaching out for assistance, and the task force has directly assisted over 27,000 Americans and organized over two dozen charter flights.”
In a separate email exchange seen by Foreign Policy, the State Department first declined an offer of assistance, then said the officer should write to an email account meant for handling matters related to the reductions in force. That email, according to the State Department officer, rarely responds and has not yet replied despite the passage of several days.
“I could show up at the badging office and walk into a task force or any office that needed backup and be useful immediately,” said the State Department officer who volunteered to help.
The United States began strikes on Iran on Feb. 28 following a weekslong U.S. military buildup. Only after the operation had started did the State Department issue a security alert advising “Americans worldwide and especially in the Middle East” to “exercise increased caution,” warning that they “may experience travel disruptions due to periodic airspace closures.” Then, when Iran had already begun retaliatory strikes on multiple Middle Eastern countries, the department sent out an alert on March 2 urging U.S. citizens in the region to immediately depart.
However, with many flights canceled and airspace closed, travelers reported difficulty returning. The State Department has since begun operating charter flights, with over two dozen so far completed, according to a March 10 statement from Assistant Secretary of State for Global Public Affairs Dylan Johnson.
Johnson said that more than 40,000 Americans had left the Middle East and returned to the United States. It is unclear how many Americans remain in the Middle East—hundreds of thousands of U.S. citizens visit or live in the region.
Former State Department officials have criticized the Trump administration’s handling of the evacuation.
“There should have been public messaging—from the State Department and U.S. embassies— urging Americans to depart, certainly in the week before U.S. military operations commenced, while commercial air options were still available,” said Yael Lempert, a former U.S. ambassador who oversaw evacuation efforts from Libya during its 2011 revolution.
Congressional leaders have also faulted the department for not doing more to evacuate American citizens ahead of time: “There are hundreds of thousands of American citizens across the Middle East and evacuating Americans on that scale requires preparations,” said Sen. Jeanne Shaheen, the ranking member and a senior Democrat on the U.S. Senate Foreign Relations Committee, in a statement to Foreign Policy.
“I have heard no good justification for why more was not done to ensure the safety of Americans earlier,” she added.
This post is part of FP’s ongoing coverage. Read more here.
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