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I think people are obfuscating deliberately and hiding up behind Information Security as a shield. One of the basic requirements of working with sensitive information is the ability to compartmentalise what is sensitive and what is not so you can effectively do your job.
You could absolutely write a brief summary with dot points of what you did in 90% of cases in the federal government.
Some examples:
Intelligence officer saying they attended 'several' 'operational and strategic meetings' where further details can be provided to someone that has a suitable security clearance.
Finance/Contract Manager saying 'spent 20 hours reviewing/drafting various contracts (with no mention of what deals, live or dead)'
If you are not willing to provide information, say why in a polite professional tone: Eg, I can't provide further details due to the sensitive nature of my work, however my workload can be confirmed by my line manager or department head (don't even need to name who that is).
This is so much better than just 'nuh uh, I work in 'Three Letter Agency' so I won't even respond'.
Edit: I generally agree that it should have been better coordinated, with direct approval given by Trump to provide legitimacy quoted in the request and the request sent to Department Heads to enact within their organisation. The Department heads should have been given reasonable discretion to exempt (by which I mean self-audit) roles that work with sensitive information, but provide a report back to DOGE about how many roles they found to not provide sufficient answers.
If Trump has put his people in place as department heads, he should trust them to enact his policy (eg Patel and Gabbard get a lot of rope here).
Applying the department's rules on classified information is a free space, you do it by doing nothing.
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