The Trump administration’s mass firings at the U.S. Food and Drug Administration have battered a tobacco regulation department already struggling to review thousands of potentially dangerous new products coming onto the market, current and former staffers told The Examination.

The staffers say that around 100 probationary jobs were axed at the Center for Tobacco Products on Feb. 15, after receiving a letter from the Department of Health and Human Services stating they were being terminated for poor performance. At least one of the employees has since been reinstated, but the vast majority of the staffers who spoke to The Examination remain without jobs despite receiving positive performance reviews.  

The center oversees an industry whose products kill nearly half a million Americans each year. With more than a thousand employees, it is responsible for regulating all tobacco products sold in the U.S. as well as educating the public about their health risks.

The Center for Tobacco Products is funded by industry ‘user fees,’ paid quarterly by tobacco manufacturers and importers, based on their market share. 

The cuts come as the FDA is engaged in “an epic struggle”  with the tobacco industry over the rules governing emerging tobacco and nicotine products. The center has faced criticism from both the industry and public health groups over its regulations and lawsuits from companies challenging its decisions. 

Most of the fired staffers who spoke to The Examination were responsible for reviewing applications for tens of thousands of  new tobacco products, including efforts to ensure that they are not appealing to kids. The agency faces a significant backlog with a lengthy approval process at a time when unauthorized products, such as candy and fruit flavored vapes from China, have flooded the market.

Thousands of federal employees have lost their jobs in recent weeks amid unprecedented staff cuts led by the Department of Government Efficiency, or DOGE, and cheered on by President Donald Trump. The mass culling has decimated entire agencies, throwing routine operations into turmoil. The White House has justified the mass dismissals because they “eliminate wasteful spending and make federal agencies more efficient, which includes removing probationary employees who are not mission critical.” 

The tobacco center firings came two days after Robert F. Kennedy Jr. was sworn in as Secretary of Health and Human Services, the department that oversees the FDA, vowing to focus on “ending the corruption, ending the corporate capture” of health regulators. 

Current and former staffers of the tobacco center interviewed by The Examination argue that the firings will not accomplish the administration’s stated goals. 

“This does not make sense because American tax dollars do not fund the Center for Tobacco Products; we are funded by users,” one terminated employee said via email. “Our salaries, office space, and other expenses are all covered by the tobacco industry.”

At the time of publication, major tobacco firms have not publicly objected to the mass firings at the center. Spokespersons for the two largest U.S. cigarette-makers, Altria and British American Tobacco’s Reynolds American unit, did not respond to messages.

One vaping industry body, the American Vapor Manufacturers, celebrated the news by posting on the social media site X that “accountability is finally coming” to the FDA Center for Tobacco Products  “after years of mismanagement, incompetence, and intransigence that has harmed countless Americans.” E-cigarette companies do not pay user fees for those products, as HHS requested in its latest budget request. 

The White House, FDA, DHHS, the Office of Personnel Management, the United States Digital Service – which houses  DOGE – did not respond to The Examination’s questions. The National Treasury Employees Union, which represents CTP workers, did not respond to requests for comment.

The Trump administration faces several ongoing legal challenges from federal workers seeking to get their jobs back. On Thursday, a federal judge in San Francisco found that the mass firings of probationary employees were likely unlawful and ordered the government’s personnel agency to inform some agencies that they had no authority to dismiss them.

‘Walking through a graveyard’ 

One employee was doom-scrolling a Reddit thread about fired federal workers when they got the termination news. Another had just been to the movies to celebrate Valentine’s Day with their husband. A third was on maternity leave, and had just shared baby photos with colleagues, two of her co-workers said. 

“I went into shock, I had a panic attack,” one fired worker said. Like most staffers interviewed for this story, they asked to remain anonymous for fear of jeopardizing possible reinstatement.  

“It was surreal, I worked hard for years to get a position with the federal government because of the environment and stability and the ability and promotion to grow professionally.”

Each of the seven fired tobacco center staffers that The Examination spoke to said they were probationary employees, meaning they had been hired recently and thus have fewer protections under civil service laws. Letters they received from HHS said their terminations were due to poor performance. 

Six of the employees shared documentation with The Examination showing that they had received positive performance reviews in recent months. The seventh had joined the agency so recently that they had not yet received a performance review.

One employee still at the center said that “things are very bleak internally” and “morale is incredibly low.” 

“Half of my teams work chats are empty now, it almost feels like walking through a graveyard,” they said. The center was already struggling to cope with the burden of reviewing applications for tens of thousands of new tobacco and nicotine products each year.

Created by Congress in 2009 as part of a sweeping tobacco control bill, the agency regulates the manufacturing, distribution and marketing of  tobacco products in the U.S. It also sets requirements for warnings labels on cigarettes, and can order products pulled from the marketplace.  

An official evaluation concluded in late 2022 that “having navigated an unprecedented number of application reviews, current staff are fatigued.”

The Department of Health and Human Services’ latest budget request called for hiring an additional 400 employees to help it achieve its mission, which includes processing the backlog of ‘premarket tobacco product applications’. In a bid to solve recruitment difficulties and a lack of scientific expertise the department was given special powers in recent years to fast-track recruitment. Those hired under that process are generally placed on probation. 

The tobacco center operates within a limited and often contradictory set of parameters. It cannot, for example, ban all cigarettes even though hundreds of thousands of people die each year from inhaling cigarette smoke. 

Its narrower efforts to protect public health are still subject to political considerations, as when the Biden administration failed to act on the agency’s proposal to outlaw menthols. And its scientific review process for approving new vapes is overshadowed by the fact that an estimated 86% of e-cigarette sales are illegal products that do not have FDA approval.  

Though it is often criticized by industry, the tobacco regulator is also not immune from criticism from public health groups. Last month, it approved Philip Morris International’s marketing of 20 different types of Zyn nicotine pouches, including flavors such as citrus, peppermint and “chill.” The Campaign for Tobacco Free Kids called the move “deeply troubling” given evidence that flavored tobacco products appeal to children and that use of nicotine pouches by teens has grown rapidly. 

FDA regulations can have ripple effects across the world. For example, in 2019, the agency approved Philip Morris International’s heated tobacco device IQOS for sale in the U.S. – stopping short of calling the product “safe” but authorizing the marketing of IQOS with ‘reduced exposure’ information. The tobacco giant has used this decision to lobby other countries for approval. 

Dustin Brace, a social scientist at the center who was fired, said that with increased workload, there could be errors in the applications' review process, and that longer processing times could make manufacturers more willing to put unauthorized products in the market to not lose money.   

Tobacco center staffers have begun hearing reports that some colleagues had been reinstated, including Brace, who got an email reversing his termination on Thursday.

“On behalf of HHS, I want to personally apologize to you for your having received the termination message and attachments, which were sent to you in error,” a Feb. 27 email from an FDA official said. 

“We are so grateful to still have you working for the FDA and serving the American public!” the email said.

Brace told The Examination that the disruption could have a chilling effect on the agency’s future recruitment.

In the past, CTP employees have gone on to take potentially more lucrative industry jobs. An Examination investigation last year found that nearly two dozen FDA lawyers left the center to advise, litigate for or work with the tobacco and vaping industry over the last 15 years. 

Fired employees told The Examination that they wanted their jobs back because they believe in the agency’s mission.

“We are not lazy. The dedicated employees at the FDA are among the hardest-working individuals I have ever worked alongside,” one terminated staffer said via email. “We come to work each day with a singular mission: to protect public health and ensure the safety of the American people. And yet, we’ve been tossed aside by the very country we vowed to serve.”

Fer Aguirre contributed reporting.