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Last week, we heard from a young public health worker in Iowa named Bri McNulty, who'd been terminated abruptly over email in February amid a slew of federal workforce dismissals. Well, yesterday, McNulty got an equally surprising email hiring her back. NPR's Yuki Noguchi has this update on the bewildering situation facing some federal employees.
YUKI NOGUCHI, BYLINE: A lot has happened since I last spoke to Bri McNulty about a week ago. In that time, an old boss at Penn State had already offered to hire the 23-year-old back. She's made plans to move out of Iowa City, where she'd moved in late 2023 to take a prestigious fellowship with the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. She's even found a new place to live near the new job.
BRI MCNULTY: Yesterday morning, I had signed the offer letter, I signed my lease for an apartment, and I was in the parking lot of FedEx to return my CDC laptop and everything.
NOGUCHI: But McNulty decided to check email on the laptop one last time. That's when she saw the subject line, read this email immediately.
MCNULTY: You should return to duty under your previous work schedule. We apologize for any disruption that this may have caused.
NOGUCHI: McNulty says, once again, she wasn't sure what to make of it all.
MCNULTY: It's sketchy again because the email is from a contact we don't have. We've never gotten anything from employeenotifications@cdc.gov, and it's also not signed off by anyone. It just says thanks - comma - and that's the email. And also, the apology for any disruption this may have caused is just salt in the wound, if I'm being honest (laughter).
NOGUCHI: McNulty grew up dreaming of working in public health at the CDC. The pandemic solidified that commitment. She was among an elite group of 66 fellows chosen by the agency in 2023 to help various public health efforts around the country. McNulty was assigned to the Iowa Cancer Consortium, a small group working on state-wide efforts to combat what is the country's second-highest cancer rate. McNulty says that dream job soured suddenly, like a bad romance.
MCNULTY: The way I'm, like, kind of thinking about this is that this has been such an abusive relationship in the sense of, like, we got let go, and now this is the job, or the abusive partner, like, texting us randomly again, asking what we're up to.
NOGUCHI: Kelly Wells Sittig is executive director for Iowa Cancer Consortium and had been McNulty's boss until three weeks ago. Sittig says CDC has informed her nothing about plans to bring back McNulty or the agency's elite Public Health Associate Program that sponsored her.
KELLY WELLS SITTIG: There's so much uncertainty and lack of clarity, not only in this situation but I think in a lot of other ways, about resources that are going to be available for things like cancer control but also, more broadly, public health, health care research.
NOGUCHI: Bri McNulty decided not to take back the CDC job, but it's not for lack of loving it or the work.
MCNULTY: I don't trust the job to last again. And I personally have kind of come to this point of CDC is not off the table for life for me, but it is off the table for the next four years.
NOGUCHI: McNulty says she hopes that those working in public health, like her, will focus on surviving to see better days.
MCNULTY: We can't focus on progress when they're trying to dismantle all these agencies and organizations. So we need to focus on making sure we don't lose what we already have, but we can't think about going forward.
NOGUCHI: CDC spokespeople did not respond to requests seeking comment. Yuki Noguchi, NPR News.
(SOUNDBITE OF NIKI SONG, "BEFORE") Transcript provided by NPR, Copyright NPR.
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