The Department of Housing and Urban Development reduced its workforce by 29% in 2025 as part of the White House’s broader effort to slash the size of the federal workforce, according to a new report released by the Government Accountability Office on Wednesday.
In total, 3,188 employees left the department from December 2024 to December 2025, largely through deferred resignation programs, according to the GAO. The report, which covered changes within the agency throughout fiscal year 2025, also said that more than half of the employees who left the department had worked at HUD for at least a decade, including many who had more than 20 years of service.
In the same period of time, nearly half of HUD’s grant programs did not award new grants due to new requirements set by the agency and delays on notices of funding opportunities, which organizations use to apply for federal dollars.
As a result of the staffing and funding changes, housing organizations that administer federally funded programs reported difficulties communicating with HUD and navigating its programs to the GAO. They reported canceled meetings, confusion and lapses in fair-housing grant funding.
Trending
“We interviewed 20 stakeholder organizations about these changes. Nearly all said that experienced points of contact had left,” the GAO report states. “Some stakeholders had to reduce services or staffing during funding gaps; others reported delays with physical inspections of properties.”
HUD did not respond to the GAO’s requests for information throughout the audit, according to the report. The study was based on interviews with stakeholders that included national housing organizations, federal grant recipients and public housing authorities, as well as an analysis of federal HUD data on spending and hiring.
The GAO also found that funding gaps and shifting guidance from HUD have made it harder to enforce fair-housing law — at the same time that the Trump administration has overhauled fair-housing enforcement and withdrawn guidance documents.
The study also found that only 32 of HUD’s 68 “active” grant programs made new awards in fiscal year 2025. HUD also terminated 144 federal contracts of 675 active contracts in that time, which resulted in spending being cut by approximately $367 million.
Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-Massachusetts), the ranking member of the Senate Banking, Housing and Urban Affairs Committee, and Rep. Maxine Waters (D-California), the ranking member of the House Financial Services Committee, along with other Democratic lawmakers, requested that the GAO conduct the audit.
The lawmakers admonished the Trump administration over its handling of the department.
“This new report from the Congressional watchdog reveals that the Trump Administration is slashing housing program staff and illegally refusing to fund grants that help boost housing supply,” Warren said in a statement. “Trump’s draconian cuts mean that more Americans have fallen behind on rent, housing quality is getting worse, and enforcement against housing discrimination is all but eliminated.”
The White House and HUD did not respond to The Washington Sun’s request for comment.
The report cites the Fair Housing Initiatives Program, which the federal government uses to fund organizations that conduct investigations of discrimination in housing, as one of the programs most affected by the administration’s actions.
One grantee told the GAO that their organization had “stopped all fair housing testing, accepted fewer new complaints, and referred potential clients elsewhere or to HUD” due to the lack of federal funding. Another said their organization had only opened 25 investigations since February 2025 after HUD terminated funding for its grants, “compared with 82 during the preceding 10 months” when their grant was active.
Author
