A few thoughts on the year about to close.

Driving on the Donald J. Trump George Washington Memorial Parkway the other day, I was impressed by the progress in the reconstruction of this vital artery. The contractors and the Trump National Park Service planned well, and the road has remained reasonably passable over the past couple of years. Now the trip to the Donald J. Trump John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts has gotten easier. Ditto for trips to the Donald J. Trump Ronald Reagan Washington National Airport.

I’ve always liked where the Parkway runs close to the Trump Potomac River. You can see across to Trump Washington Monument and the Trump Tidal Basin. But, stately as the nation’s capital appears, change and lots of chaos have marked the calendar year about to end.

But seriously, looking at the D.C. skyline, one wonders about the real state of the republic.

If you search “trump timeline,” you’ll find timelines from many interest groups, most of whom feel aggrieved by the second Trump administration. The release of the Epstein files, “undermining elections,” deportation and Immigration and Customs Enforcement activity, reversing energy policies, legal tangling with Harvard University, military activity against Venezuela — Trump activities make for compelling observation. A lot of this is press-induced, and the Trump style eggs it on. Yet norms have stretched.

I would add that only some of what Trump has done is completely original. But he does things, let’s say, in highly original ways. The result is we have two branches of government in contention with one another. The third branch, and the one detailed first in the Constitution, has rendered itself into an observant chorus with no say over the score.

For federal employees, 2025 will rank as the oddest year many have ever endured. It started with the DOGE swarms, slashing their way to and fro. Then came the deferred resignation program and layoffs. Mass return to the office. Cancellation of collective bargaining agreements at several agencies. Difficulties in settling retirement benefits.

So much news, it almost made me regret retiring. The workforce reductions and changes of conditions may all fall within an administration’s discretionary powers. But rough treatment of persons falls outside of decency. Let’s hope it stops in 2026. I remember a time when a new president of a company I worked for brought in a gaggle of MBAs to do cost cutting. The attitudes felt worse than the cuts, and the company eventually disappeared anyhow.

One thing 2025 has taught me: Keep things in perspective. The worst job situations I remember? I can chuckle about them now. That’s what time does. I once secretly flew to New Jersey and back for a job interview — all in a really extended lunch hour. To be honest, the new job seemed dull, and I never got the offer. Luckily, the situation I was seeking to leave changed overnight for the better, the way better. While you are going through cavalier and high-handed treatment, it’s no fun.

And what about the nation you serve? The absence of any serious debate about what the Government Accountability Office politely calls fiscal unsustainability strikes me as the worst quality in Congress and executive branch policy makers.

It’s not as if no one knows that next year alone the federal deficit will add $2 trillion to the $30 trillion national debt. That Social Security outlays increasingly surpass revenues for as far as the eye can see. That healthcare programs exceed the $3 trillion mark. That interest payments on public debt have passed the $1 trillion mark. The absolute numbers are big, and they are worsening when expressed as a percentage of the nation’s economic output.

So my wish for the nation in the year ahead is fact-facing and rationality, especially on the part of so-called lawmakers.

Beyond thinking of any possible policy and programmatic fixes, the government must resolve to become a better steward of the money it does print and spend.

I’m thinking of Minnesota. The federal prosecutor on the Minnesota Medicare fraud scheme described it as “staggering industrial-scale fraud.” As Trump would say, and McDonald’s used to say, billions and billions. The theft — and it is simple, naked theft — is both heartbreaking and maddening. At an estimated $9 billion, it makes the worst armed robbery seem like child’s play. One almost thinks the perpetrators deserve hanging, such is the extent and callous shrewdness of the crimes. But it also evidences a near total breakdown in program planning, execution and oversight — mainly at the state level, but there’s federal responsibility too. Did anyone notice or care that this was going on?

The staff cuts and turmoil have affected constituent service. People I speak to seem amusedly resigned to how places like the IRS, Social Security and the Postal Service operate. Line employees mostly want to serve effectively, but what kind of backing do they get?

The week before Christmas, I stopped in at my local Postal Service office. It’s busy, a beehive of a facility. I recently became president of a very small non-profit foundation, and we needed to move the P.O. box from Virginia to Maryland so I could easily get the incoming donation checks.

On a Thursday morning, only one employee manned the four-bay counter. Efficiently as she worked, still the line kept stretching to nine, then a dozen, people deep. For a reason I only dimly comprehended, I couldn’t complete the transfer because of a mismatch in phone numbers. I straightened it out a couple of days later, when I had the right information. Two clerks were then on duty, and they kept the lines short.

The post My wish for 2026: Rationality in the Trump era first appeared on Federal News Network.

Interview transcript

Terry Gerton It’s been a tough year for federal employees. There’s been lot of uncertainty about jobs and missions. We’ve had shutdown. They got paid, they didn’t get paid. What kind of a toll does that accumulation have on mental health?

Roz Beroza You know, it may look very differently for every person, but generally, it has been a traumatic year, which trauma is very specific. It has a long shelf life, but initially, it feels like you’ve been run over by a truck. You’re disoriented. You could be in freeze. This is not just a financial loss, it’s a multi-faceted loss, almost as though a tsunami took everything and internally you lose your identity, you lose your future as you always assumed it would be. The toll for this is huge.

Terry Gerton How does it manifest itself for folks on a day-to-day basis?

Roz Beroza As I said, Terry, It’s really different for people. Some people don’t feel it. They just start doing what they need to do. Other people cannot get out of bed. Many people feel panicky. We saw that in the Washington Post article in March. There was an article about the effects on the federal employees, and they talked about suicide in that report.

Terry Gerton So we’re taking all of that, and now we’re coming into a holiday period, which is always stressful in some way, shape or form. But for folks who’ve lived through these last nine or 10 months, and now maybe coming into the holidays with financial uncertainty, job uncertainty, how does that compound the situation?

Roz Beroza It compounds it a great deal because you come into this time of year when you had particular traditions that might have not felt like a financial cost, but this year cannot be — you can’t do the same things you’ve always done. It’s very painful. You can’t buy your kids everything you wanted to buy them. It’s a reminder, not just your thinking brain, but your whole nervous system. So it takes a lot of energy and people feel very, can feel very exhausted.

Terry Gerton Well tell us about therapy for feds and why you launched this initiative for former federal employees.

Roz Beroza Well, I launched it around May of last year, and, you know, I grew up around Washington, D.C., the government, everybody worked for the government, everybody’s parents worked for the government. That’s our industry here. And it felt like this can’t be happening. The numbers that were predicted, but they started to happen, these huge, massive layoffs. And honestly, Terry, it was an effort to deal with my own despair. I needed to do something, and I looked for a while to see, is there another organization who’s doing something that’s really focused on the mental health of these government employees? And nothing was there. So I just started posting on websites.

Terry Gerton I’m speaking with Roz Beroza. She’s the founder of Therapy4Feds. Roz, tell us about the programs that you offer and how it makes mental health therapy accessible, maybe for people who’ve lost their jobs or who might be struggling financially.

Roz Beroza Therapy4Feds is sort of like a clearinghouse where somebody who has lost their job because of this administration’s policies, so that’s in 2025, can seek help from a licensed mental health therapist at either no cost or maximum cost of $35 per hour. [There are] Five sessions and at the end of those five sessions they can either continue, they can use their insurance if they have it, it’s up to the therapist and the person that is seeking the service. We also have partnered with an organization called Give an Hour, which also has been in existence since after 9-11. And so they’re longstanding, and their mission is to give affordable, well-known, free health care to those in the military, people who have been victims of fraud, financial fraud, and people with rare illnesses. So we are working together to promote, and also if any of our people can draw from their pool of therapists, we’re using the same pool.

Terry Gerton Do you find with the former federal employees any resistance to seek mental health therapy?

Roz Beroza You know, I don’t really have a handle on that. I have a handle on the huge numbers that want it, that are at some time during this year, like after the CDC in Georgia, I received huge numbers of people who need it and they would email me about being desperate to get some help, and at that time, I had two therapists in Georgia. You have to have somebody who is licensed in your state. So I have a huge effort out to get licensed therapists to join our network.

Terry Gerton Tell us about how therapists who are interested can partner with you.

Roz Beroza Well, they can go to my site, which is Therapy4Feds.org and they can register on the site, and it’s very quick to register. You have to, as I say, be licensed, have malpractice insurance. And what happens then is those who are seeking therapy go to their state and they can choose somebody who’s licensed in their state.

Terry Gerton And for someone who’s listening who might feel overwhelmed themselves right now, what’s the first step they can take to get help? Same.

Roz Beroza Same. Go to Therapy4feds.org and there’s a section there that says “seeking a therapist.”

The post Therapy4Feds offers a lifeline for former federal employees facing tough times first appeared on Federal News Network.