Members of EPA’s DOGE team joined Administrator Lee Zeldin’s office in February as temporary government employees working without pay.
Those and other details about EPA’s Department of Government Efficiency team members were recently revealed in response to a Freedom of Information Act request from POLITICO’s E&E News. The documents released by EPA offer additional insight into the agency’s DOGE team that’s working behind the scenes to cut agency spending.
Kathryn Loving and Erica Jehling joined the agency in February as full-time temporary staffers on EPA’s DOGE team, the records show. They’re serving as “special government employees” whose employment under their current appointments can’t exceed 130 working days per year.
Both Loving and Jehling were assigned to work in the EPA administrator’s office, the records show, and they both waived pay for their work.
The DOGE team members’ job details align with general public statements made by DOGE leader Elon Musk about hiring government-downsizing enthusiasts — without pay — to work on the Trump administration’s cost-cutting efforts.
The employment details also raise questions about the future of the EPA DOGE team following the expiration of their temporary employment status. Musk, who’s also serving as a special government employee, is preparing to scale back his own work leading the governmentwide DOGE operation.
EPA did not respond to questions about the expected duration of the agency’s DOGE team or to questions about whether Loving and Jehling are expected to leave government service following the expiration of their current appointments.
It’s unclear why EPA’s FOIA response did not include employment details about Cole Killian, another DOGE employee assigned to EPA.
Loving, Jehling and Killian have all been involved in internal EPA discussions about canceling spending that the administration deemed wasteful, according to emails released as part of a lawsuit challenging funding freezes.
EPA’s records show that both Loving and Jehling were identified as experts with a “high level of expertise not available in the regular workforce.”
The forms indicate that both employees would be assigned to a “sensitive position” and would require access to confidential business information, controlled unclassified information or other nonpublic information.
Prior to joining the Trump team, Loving worked at multiple biotechnology firms, ProPublica reported. Jehling has worked at SpaceX — one of Musk’s companies — since 2016, including as its purchasing director, according to her LinkedIn profile.
Ahead of Trump’s inauguration, the DOGE team leaders stressed that they wanted a small crew of experts willing to work long hours for no pay.
“We are assisting the Trump transition team to identify and hire a lean team of small-government crusaders, including some of the sharpest technical and legal minds in America,” Musk and Vivek Ramaswamy wrote in a November op-ed that offered a road map for DOGE.
Musk also posted on social media in November, “Indeed, this will be tedious work, make lots of enemies & compensation is zero. What a great deal!”
The Trump administration has suggested that — following a kick start from DOGE during the administration’s first months in office — department leaders plan to continue their push to enact a dramatic restructuring of the government and cuts to the federal workforce.
Contact these reporters on Signal at r_bravender.93 and KevinBogardus.89.
