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Timeline › 2025 › February › 28

February 28, 2025

3 entries on this date.

GSA eliminated 18F, firing all ~90 employees of the federal technology unit, under DOGE direction

On February 28, 2025, the General Services Administration eliminated 18F, its internal technology consulting unit, firing all approximately 90 employees at the direction of DOGE. GSA Deputy Administrator Thomas Shedd announced the closure in an internal email; 18F's website was taken offline the same day. 18F was a congressionally-funded team of engineers and designers that helped federal agencies modernize digital services and largely paid for itself through interagency billing.

Iowa Gov. Kim Reynolds signed SF418, making Iowa the first state to remove gender identity from its civil rights code

On Feb. 28, 2025, Iowa Gov. Kim Reynolds signed Senate File 418, removing "gender identity" as a protected class from the Iowa Civil Rights Act and making Iowa the first U.S. state to strip an established protected class from its civil rights code. The law codifies binary definitions of sex tied to birth, ends transgender Iowans' ability to change the sex marker on their birth certificates, and bars instruction on "gender theory" in kindergarten through sixth grade. It took effect July 1, 2025.

Kansas Senate efficiency committee withheld public-portal records from Kansas Reflector past KORA deadlines while granting lawmakers early access

After Kansas Reflector requested public submissions to the Kansas Senate Committee on Government Efficiency's online portal on Feb. 25, 2025, committee chair Sen. Renee Erickson withheld the records well past the Kansas Open Records Act's three-day response requirement, releasing them to the outlet only on April 9, 2025. During the delay, Erickson granted committee members and other senators access to the same records by mid-March 2025. Kansas Reflector's editor-in-chief filed a KORA complaint with the Kansas Attorney General in May 2025.