Marco Rubio unveils a sweeping reorganization of the State Department

Secretary of State Marco Rubio unveiled a plan Tuesday to significantly reorganize the State Department, saying the redesign would reverse “decades of bloat and bureaucracy” within the agency.

The proposed shake-up of America’s primary foreign policy institution comes as the Trump administration continues to reorientate the United States on the world stage to align with the president’s “America First” agenda while cutting costs and downsizing staff in a bid for efficiency.

The effort targets some human rights programs and others focused on war crimes and democracy, according to internal documents shared with The Washington Post.

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On Tuesday morning, the State Department also sent its reorganization plans to the Senate Foreign Relations Committee and the House Foreign Affairs Committee, which oversee the department.

The plan includes the elimination of 132 offices and 700 positions, said a congressional aide who reviewed the documents. One hundred and thirty eight offices were transferred or “reorganized,” in changes that weren’t clearly explained and left lingering questions about how the shake-up would functionally change things, the aid said.

U.S. lawmakers in both parties have raised concerns about major changes to congressionally-mandated programs and agencies the Trump administration has signaled it wants to delete.

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In a post on social media, Rubio said that “region-specific functions would be consolidated to increase functionality, redundant offices will be removed, and non-statutory programs that are misaligned with America’s core national interests will cease to exist.”

Within the State Department, conjecture has swirled for weeks about the likelihood of significant staff reductions and drastic shifts in institutional priorities. In group chats and private messages, current and former officials have circulated screenshots of documents and other speculation, hoping to understand what would happen next and how many jobs could be implicated.

One document purporting to be a draft executive order, widely circulated among current and former officials over the weekend, outlined a more radical plan that involved numerous major changes, including shutting down the Bureau of African Affairs and eliminating numerous outposts across the continent.

Rubio distanced himself from that document, calling it a “hoax” and “fake news.”

Some diplomats and officials worried about the scale of reforms were heartened to learn this month that Pete Marocco, a senior official who had led the dismantling of the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID) in conjunction with tech billionaire Elon Musk’s DOGE Service, had left the department after reported clashes with Rubio.

Even so, it had long been clear that the Trump administration planned major reforms - and significant cuts - to the State Department. The question was not whether cuts would happen, but how big they would be.