HHS facing billion-dollar backlog of delayed grants after DOGE
Source: CBS News
Updated on: July 11, 2025 / 2:27 PM EDT
The Department of Health and Human Services has asked some laid-off staff if they could return to work temporarily, as the department grapples with a backlog of grants that has swelled to more than a billion dollars in the wake of hurdles set up by DOGE. Multiple HHS officials, who were not authorized to speak to the press, said the laid-off staff asked to return to work include a handful of employees who managed grants in the department's Administration for Children and Families, or ACF.
Around half of ACF's grants management staff have been laid off or left under the Trump administration, one official said. An HHS spokesperson said that ACF has brought back to work "limited personnel to support the effective transition of operations" after its April layoffs, consistent with other parts of the department.
"Last week, ACF contacted a small number of grants management staff to inform them that they may be required to return to a work status to complete such transition activities, however no grants management staff have been returned to a work status at this time," the spokesperson said in a statement. Delayed grants at ACF include money for residential services for unaccompanied migrant children, the National Indigenous Domestic Violence Hotline and youth homelessness. Funding has already lapsed for other programs funded elsewhere in the department.
At the Health Resources and Services Administration, the TargetHIV portal of resources for providers who care for people with HIV has been frozen, after funding ended June 30. Within the ACF, one official described the plans as an "all hands on deck" sprint. Another said it would be "nearly impossible" to process grants in time, without cutting corners on the usual process set up to carefully review, negotiate and award the money. Two officials said that the department was also weighing leaning on contractors and other staff to catch up on the backlog of grants.
Read more: https://www.cbsnews.com/news/hhs-facing-billion-dollar-backlog-of-delayed-grants-after-doge/
I suppose they thought it was cute to run around a stage with a chain saw.
