The General Services Administration’s acting leader told employees in a recent all-staff meeting that “nobody” from the Department of Government Efficiency is at the agency.

“There’s nobody working for DOGE here,” acting GSA Administrator Stephen Ehikian said at a March 20 town hall.

A document obtained by Federal News Network, however, shows DOGE officials across the federal government dominate a shortlist of individuals allowed past security on the sixth floor of GSA’s headquarters, where the administrator’s office is located.

Federal News Network obtained a partial copy of the “A-Suite Access List,” an inventory of personnel with clearance to enter the GSA’s administrator’s office and other parts of the sixth floor with increased security.

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During the town hall’s question-and-answer session, a GSA employee asked Ehikian who is leading GSA’s DOGE team.

“I’d say there’s no DOGE leader here. I’m running the administration. I do coordinate with the DOGE team, but I am controlling the administration here,” Ehikian added. “There is no DOGE team inside of GSA.”

Ehikian told employees during the town hall that “my door is always open.” But several GSA employees say that increased security measures prevent most employees from entering the sixth floor of headquarters. Access to much of the sixth floor, they say, is blocked off with whiteboards, a “Do Not Enter” sign and a security guard.

“If your name is not on that list, you’re not allowed to enter that space on the sixth floor,” one GSA employee said.

The list of names obtained by Federal News Network is not a complete list of personnel granted access to the sixth floor. Federal News Network obtained a partial copy of the A-Suite Access List, which runs alphabetically.

In the partial list of names obtained by Federal News Network, only Ehikian and DOGE chief operating officer Steve Davis are designated “VIP” status.

DOGE employees added to the A-Suite Access List have been assigned to more than two dozen agencies so far — according to reporting from the New York Times, Axios, NewsNation, Fox News, NBC News and Business Insider.

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A partial list of names available on GSA’s A-Suite Access List is available here.

The range of DOGE officials granted access to secured areas of GSA’s headquarters underscores the central role it holds in the Trump administration’s plans to reshape the federal workforce.

Ehikian told employees at last month’s town hall that GSA is the “backbone of federal government operations,” and provides governmentwide support on procurement, real estate, IT and software.

“We literally have an impact on the administration’s mandate right now, which is around efficiency,” Ehikian said.

The A-Suite Access List includes Airbnb co-founder Joe Gebbia, who is running DOGE’s Digital Retirement Project, according to reporting from NewsNation. The project is focused on digitizing millions of federal employees’ retirement records stored in a mine in western Pennsylvania.

Anthony Armstrong, a Morgan Stanley banker — and another DOGE team member deployed to OPM — told Fox News in a March 28 interview that the DOGE team is looking to reduce the number of governmentwide payroll providers from four to one.

“Everything from the IRS to the Smithsonian gets paid through the Agriculture Department, so that just doesn’t make any sense. There should be one. You can debate where it should go. You should get the efficiencies of pulling those together,” Armstrong said.

WIRED and several other news outlets reported last week that DOGE gained access to the Interior Department’s Federal Personnel and Payroll System, which processes paychecks for about 276,000 federal employees across the federal government.

The Interior Department and three other systems run by the departments of Defense, Veterans Affairs and Agriculture account for about 80% of the federal civilian workforce’s payroll.

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Armstrong said the DOGE team is using “AI and brute force” to map out an organizational chart of the federal bureaucracy — and working with agency heads and their senior staff to identify unnecessary offices and functions.

“We’re going line-by-line in the employee org charts, line-by-line from the bottom up, talking about every function. ‘Is it duplicative?’” Armstrong said.

Elon Musk, DOGE’s de facto leader, told Fox News that the team is focused on rooting out fraud, waste and abuse across the federal government.

“The things we’re talking about are so basic that the federal government can’t pass an audit. It doesn’t know where the money is going,” Musk said.

DOGE officials make up a majority of the A-Suite Access List names reviewed by Federal News Network, but some non-DOGE officials — including Federal Chief Information Officer Gregory Barbaccia and Federal Acquisition Service Commissioner Josh Gruenbaum — also appear on the list.

GSA plans ‘build-back’ after workforce cuts

Among its priorities, GSA is looking to cut its portfolio of governmentwide building space by 50%, with a “disproportionate” amount of office space coming from the Washington, D.C. metro area.

In March, GSA put the headquarters of more than a dozen agencies — including its own — on a list of more than 440 “non-core” assets it would consider selling. The agency revised the list hours after posting it, but deleted the whole list a day later.

GSA currently has a new list of 16 federal buildings “identified for accelerated disposition.”

GSA also oversees the governmentwide charge card program and recently set a $1 spending limit on cards belonging to its employees and contractors. GSA has also asked 15 other agencies to reduce the number of authorized cardholders.

GSA is also pursuing a takeover of contracting functions at other federal agencies, as part of a reorganization of its procurement shop.

Amid all these changes, GSA has gone through major personnel cuts. Its Public Buildings Service cut about 63% of its workforce so far and eliminated the staff of entire regional offices through a reduction in force.

PBS officials told staff in a town hall last week that the agency will go on a “firing freeze” until June.

According to a GSA employee, PBS officials are waiting to see how many employees accept a second “deferred resignation” offer, as well as early retirement offers and separation incentives worth up to $25,000.

Ehikian said GSA is currently going through a “slimming down of spend,” and a significant reduction in staffing. But he also told employees that the agency will soon undergo a “build-back phase,” in line with the Trump administration’s efficiency agenda.

“Build back is around modernization efforts. This is how we bring new tools in to allow us to do more with less,” Ehikian said.

“We’re consolidating and centralizing procurement. There’s an opportunity within the IT side as well. We already have agencies reaching out and saying, ‘Hey, can we offload this to the GSA?’ Yes, we should be saying yes to that,” he added.

FAS Josh Gruenbaum told employees at the March 20 town hall that the agency has “kicked off a cross-agency effort to consolidate governmentwide procurement,” and that the executive order will “quadruple” GSA’s contracting volume.

FAS recently put out job postings for contract specialists and supervisory contract specialists.

The job announcements are for contract specialists at the GS-12 and -13 pay scales, as well as supervisory positions at the GS-14 and -15 levels. All positions are available in several locations, including Washington, D.C., San Francisco and 10 other locations around the country.

If you would like to contact this reporter about recent changes happening in the federal government, please email JHeckman@FederalNewsNetwork.com or reach out on Signal at: JHeckman.29

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