Trump and Musk addressed email termination threats, neither cleared up the confusion

After days of confusion over emails asking government workers to detail what they had done over the previous week, President Donald Trump didn't clear things up when asked about them in his Cabinet meeting on Wednesday.

Asked by ABC News' Mary Bruce if the 1million workers who didn't reply to the email risked termination, Trump said, "I wouldn't say that we're thrilled about it. They haven't responded. Now, maybe they don't exist. Maybe we're paying people that don't exist," he said. "But those people are on the bubble ...they're going to be gone."

But despite Trump's assertion, there is still mixed guidance on how employees should respond.

Millions of workers were left in limbo after Musk posted on X Saturday that they could be terminated if they did not respond to a "What did you do last week?" email from the Office of Personnel Management. Soon after the e-mail was sent, some agency leaders, particularly those who work with sensitive and confidential information, told their employees not to reply. Others cautioned against replying to the request without guidance.

OPM late Monday afternoon offered guidance saying a reply was not mandatory and to rely on guidance from individual agencies. Then Musk offered another threat in a post Monday night, saying employees were being given "another chance" and "Failure to respond a second time will result in termination" and set a deadline of Tuesday night.

To add to the confusion, Musk said he intended to send another email without saying when. Asked by Bruce if a response to the next email, Trump didn't answer directly, saying, "We're trying to figure out, do they exist? Who are they? And it's possible that a lot of those people will be actually fired."

It is unclear if Musk and his Department of Government Efficiency have any power to terminate employees over the email request. The previous emails sent from OPM, in essence the government's human relations department, did not have any mention of termination -- those threats were issued only from Musk on his X platform.

Those not following Musk on social media might have not been aware of the threats.

The American Federation of Government Employees (AFGE), the largest union of federal workers, called the email unlawful and has threatened legal action.

Wednesday's remarks came after a confusing weekend for government workers.

Senior White House officials -- who had not been fully briefed on the plan -- were initially caught off guard, multiple sources told ABC News.

Before OPM weighed in Monday afternoon, some agencies like Health and Human Services first told employees to reply then reversed itself hours later before issuing specific guidelines on what employees could or could not post in their replies.

White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt claimed Tuesday that the move was to ensure that federal employees were actually working their jobs and declined to comment if this was a tactic to eliminate more federal jobs.

The White House claimed Trump sent Musk an e-mail with five things he had done, but they were generic talking points.

Musk told reporters Wednesday that the email was his idea after the president told him to "be more aggressive" with his cuts.

"I said, 'Can we send out an email to everyone just saying what did you get done last week?' The president said, 'Yes.' So, we did that," Musk said.

Musk used similar tactics when he bought Twitter, which he renamed X, making employees submit weekly reports detailing projects and accomplishments and contributions. Replying to a post on Saturday pointing out the simiarities , Musk wrote, “It works.”

When asked by Bruce if he had a target number of employees he wanted to cut, Musk didn't give a concrete answer.

"We wish to keep everyone who is doing a job that is essential and doing that job well, but if the job is not essential or they're not doing the job well, they obviously should not," he said.