'We're under attack by billionaires': Fired federal workers speak out on terminations [View all]
Source: ABC News
February 15, 2025, 3:52 PM
Hanna Hickman, a now-terminated worker for the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, told ABC News the last four days have been a roller coaster.
"It's scary," said Hickman, who was fired last Tuesday. "I had a real moment -- I was at CVS the other day and ... it kind of came on me all at once that I might not have health insurance in a few weeks, and that really hits you. I think it underscores the fact that we're just regular, middle-class people, just like the people we're trying to serve."
Hickman was senior litigation counsel for the Division of Enforcement at the CFPB in Washington, D.C. She is one of thousands of mostly new employees known as probationary workers laid off this week across the federal government. Those recent hires had joined the federal workforce within the last one to two years, depending on the agency, and have fewer protections.
Hickman was a probationary hire who had been at the CFPB just under two years until Tuesday around 9 p.m., when she saw a termination notice pop up on her phone. "It was shocking, frankly -- not just to us but to our direct managers, who had not been told this would happen and received notice of the terminations at the same time we did because they were CC'd," Hickman told ABC News.
Read more: https://abcnews.go.com/Politics/attack-billionaires-fired-federal-workers-speak-terminations/story?id=118862701