The Daily Beast published on 1 June 2026 an article titled "Jaw-Dropping Brain Drain Under Trump Revealed" by Will Neal.
The Trump administration has either laid off or forced into retirement about 2,000 career diplomats since the beginning of 2025. This figure does not include foreign service personnel who were fired when the administration dismantled the US Agency for International Development.
More than half of US embassies do not have a Senate-confirmed ambassador and those that are staffed at the ambassadorial level include only 8 percent career ambassadors. The vast majority of American ambassadors today are financial contributors to the Trump campaign, close friends of the administration, or family members.
