Secretary of State Marco Rubio on Tuesday unveiled a sweeping plan to dramatically restructure the State Department that would see many of its longstanding offices and hundreds of positions eliminated.
“In its current form, the department is bloated, bureaucratic, and unable to perform its essential diplomatic mission in this new era of great power competition,” Rubio said in a statement. “The sprawling bureaucracy created a system more beholden to radical political ideology than advancing America’s core national interests.”
Officials familiar with the plans say Rubio’s vision involves reducing the number of offices within the State Department from 734 to 602 and eventually wiping out roughly 700 Washington-based positions for Foreign Service and Civil Service employees.
The officials said that the reductions would not be immediate, and that leaders within the department would have 30 days to analyze and implement the plan.
Secretary of State Marco Rubio arrives at the Quai d’Orsay, France’s Minister of Foreign Affairs for high-level talks to discuss Ukraine and its security in Paris, April 17, 2025.
Julien De Rosa/Pool via AP
An updated organizational chart released by Rubio shows offices on the chopping block include those that fall under the department’s Bureau of Energy Resources and its Bureau of Conflict and Stabilization Operations, which is aimed at helping the federal government “better anticipate, prevent, and respond to conflict,” according to the department.
Other offices that would be eliminated under the plan include the Office of the Science and Technology Advisor to the Secretary, the Office of International Religious Freedoms, the Office to Monitor and Combat Trafficking in Persons, the Office of Global Women’s Issues, the Office of Global Partnerships, and the Office of Global Criminal Justice, which is aimed at coordinating the government’s response to war crimes and promoting accountability for offenders.
Under the plan, the department will also combine two bureaus focused on arms control and eliminate units focused on countering violent extremism from the department’s counterterrorism bureau.
Officials also expect that several special envoys and their offices will be eliminated.
State Department spokesperson Tammy Bruce said that reorganization did not necessarily mean that the area of focus previously covered by an eliminated office was no longer a priority for the department.
“Certainly, all these issues are important,” Bruce said, adding that department would work at “blending” those topics within the new framework so they could be “dealt with as a whole.”
However, officials say that other reductions are planned for areas in the department that were not directly impacted by the reorganization, and that undersecretaries throughout the bureau have been instructed to draw up plans to reduce their personnel by 15% — a move that could lead to thousands of additional job cuts.
State Department leadership has been under increased pressure to reduce its workforce amid broader cuts across the federal government spearheaded by Elon Musk and his Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE).
On Tuesday, Bruce downplayed the role DOGE had in the reorganization plans.
“We know the American people love the result of DOGE. I think there were some questions, perhaps, about how it was applied,” she said.
“I would say that DOGE is not in charge of this, but this is the result of what we’ve learned and the fact that we appreciate results,” Bruce added.
The Trump administration has been considering a budget proposal that would cut the State Department’s budget by roughly half, according to officials familiar with internal deliberations and documents reviewed by ABC News.
Rubio’s restructuring doesn’t address the department’s overseas operations, which officials say are also likely to undergo significant cuts in the coming months.
