Career diplomats and other staff begin receiving notices amid Trump administration cull of about 15% of workforce

The US state department has begun issuing the first of more than 1,350 termination notices as part of a huge reorganisation of America’s diplomatic corps under the secretary of state, Marco Rubio, according to internal documents and US diplomats at the state department on Friday.

Career diplomats and other staff began to receive the notices on Friday morning, days after the supreme court lifted a ban on the Trump administration moving forward with mass firings of government employees that will affect hundreds of thousands of federal workers.

In an internal email obtained by the Guardian on Friday, state department workers were told that nearly 3,000 employees would leave as part of a vast reorganisation meant to align the department’s goals with Donald Trump’s stated goal of putting America first.