New SEC chief tells staff to nix bulleted emails about work activities

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By Chris Prentice and Douglas Gillison

NEW YORK/WASHINGTON (Reuters) -The chairman of the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission told staff Thursday they no longer need to send weekly emails detailing their work accomplishments from the previous week, according to two sources with knowledge of the matter.

The initiative, launched in February by Office of Personnel Management (OPM) and Elon Musk, required federal workers across agencies to send five bullet points of the prior week’s accomplishments to the federal government’s human resources agency, sparking concerns over handling of confidential matters as well as backlash from many government employees.

On Thursday, SEC Chairman Paul Atkins told agency employees in an email they no longer need to send the emails, according to the sources who spoke on condition of anonymity.

The White House referred Reuters to the SEC and the SEC declined to comment. A spokesperson for OPM said the decision was up to the agencies.

The introduction of the weekly requirement was seen as controversial, especially after Musk said in a post on X, formerly known as Twitter, in February that failure to respond to the initial email would amount to resignation.

The effort came alongside a broader initiative under the Trump administration and coordinated by Musk’s DOGE to slash staffing and reduce spending across federal agencies.

His work with DOGE has since ended, and tensions have mounted between the billionaire and Trump.

(Reporting by Chris Prentice in New York and Douglas Gillison in Washington; editing by Pete Schroeder and Nick Zieminski)