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Visitors at the John F Kennedy Presidential library in Boston were asked to leave after staffing cuts made by the Trump administration forced the institution to close its doors indefinitely.
Library officials received a phone call from the National Archives on Tuesday morning informing them that all employees still in their probationary period were being laid off effective immediately, CBS reported.
The library closed at 2 p.m. with a sign posted on the door reading: “Due to an Executive Order concerning a ‘reduction in force (RIF),’ the JFK Library and Museum will be closed to the public until further notice.”
According to the Washington Post, five employees, all of whom had worked at the library for less than a year, were let go.
Former Congressman Joe Kennedy III, a grand-nephew of JFK, said around a half dozen positions, all critical to daily operations, had been affected.
“Closing government libraries to try and fund a tax cut for the wealthy seems like a really bad way to balance the budget. But par for the course for this administration,” Kennedy said, speaking to WBZ TV.
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“When we start shutting down libraries in the name of government efficiency, we have got a problem.”
He added: “I would like to think that it was not a deliberate target at the Kennedy Library, but I think what we’ve seen is that there is not exactly a whole lot of thought given to what are the consequences of these actions.”
Established in 1979, the JFK Library is open seven days a week for most of the year. The institution receives “an annual federal appropriation for building maintenance and a portion of its personnel costs” from Congress, but the majority of its budget is generated by admission fees and donations.
Its closure comes a week after President Trump named himself chairman of the Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts in Washington, sparking outrage and prompting artist walkouts.
Along with Elon Musk and the Department of Government Efficiency, the president has continued on his crusade to gut the federal workforce, last week ordering government agencies to lay off nearly all probationary employees.
The president has said that the federal workforce is “bloated” and filled with “people that are unnecessary,” although agencies including the Agriculture Department and National Nuclear Security Administration have already been forced to backtrack on their layoffs.
