Macon’s Ezell leads OPM, agency pivotal to Trump administration’s federal job cuts

The U.S. Office of Personnel Management has been at the heart of the Trump Administration’s efforts to reduce the size of the federal workforce, leaving tens of thousands of civil service employees without a job. More cuts are on the horizon as the administration eyes firing some 80,000 Veterans Administration employees, according to a report from the AP. 

The man in charge of those job eliminations, the acting director of OPM, was until January the branch chief of data and analytics at OPM’s Macon office, a nondescript white office building on Log Cabin Drive protected by a chain link and razor wire fence.

Charles “Chuck” Ezell first began working in Macon in 2003 and started with OPM in 2017, according to his LinkedIn page. The 1996 Georgia Southern graduate spent years in the private sector, specializing in software development and large data systems.

Ezell’s footprint in Middle Georgia is small. Despite working on and off in the area for more than 20 years, his personal activities appear to be limited to work with various Presbyterian churches and building custom guitars through his company Ocmulgee Guitars. Ezell served as an elder of Presbyterian church in Houston County, according to the church’s website archives. 

His sudden elevation from branch chief to one of the most consequential positions in the federal government is bemusing, even to Ezell. In a February interview with byFaith, a magazine published by the Presbyterian Church in America, Ezell said he was contacted by Trump’s advisors “a few months ago” and, after a series of meetings, was offered the acting director job. 

“How did I end up here? There’s no simple explanation apart from the providence of God,” he told byFaith’s Andy Jones. “I humbly accepted the opportunity to serve America and the president in this way.”

OPM was created during the Carter administration and functions as the federal government’s human resources department. 

The office has been tasked with implementing directives from the Department of Government Efficiency, run by billionaire Elon Musk. In January, OPM sent out a memo encouraging some two million civil service employees to apply for resignation.

Many of OPM’s efforts have been challenged in court. The office recently amended a January order directing all government agencies to create a list of recently hired employees, noting that OPM is not directing agencies to fire these employees. The change came after a federal judge ruled OPM does not have the legal authority to hire or fire employees in other agencies.

Ezell’s posts on X, formerly Twitter, highlight the size of the federal government and applaud the Trump administration requiring federal workers to end remote work. A week after Donald Trump was inaugurated, Ezell tweeted “Over the past century, the federal government’s size and role in the economy have expanded dramatically. In 1920, federal spending was just 3% of GDP. Today, it stands at nearly 30%! All while the private sector shrunk 20%.  Anyone agree this trend is unsustainable?”

The OPM public relations office did not respond to a request for comment for this story.