Project Overview

Department of Government Waste is an ongoing documentary portrait project examining the personal impact of federal workforce reductions, contract terminations, and program cuts across the United States.

In this era of sweeping government layoffs and forced resignations, the human cost of policy decisions is often reduced to headlines, sound bites, and statistics. Workers and contractors are dismissed as “waste,” while the consequences for their lives and families go largely unseen. This project documents that gap, centering the people behind the numbers and recording how sudden job loss reshapes identity, stability, and purpose.

Each participant is photographed using a consistent studio format and paired with excerpts from recorded conversations about work, identity, purpose, and what it means to be told their role no longer has value. Together, the portraits and voices create a record of a moment when policy decisions ripple far beyond the institutions where they begin. Interview excerpts have been lightly edited for clarity, length, and narrative flow while preserving each participant’s meaning and voice.

Approach

At its core, the project is a studio-based portrait archive. The visual consistency and restrained presentation are intentional, allowing the individuals themselves to carry the work.

Intent

Department of Government Waste centers people often reduced to line items in public discourse. By pairing formal portraiture with lived experience, the project challenges impersonal narratives around efficiency, waste, and expediency, inviting viewers to consider the human cost embedded in policy decisions.