In February 2001, during the Fernando de la Rúa government, SIDE was suffering from budget cuts (reduced by half) and political pressures to renew itself. The staff was reduced by half, 1,300 personnel were laid off. One of the reasons given for the clean-up were that many staff members had been involved in human rights violations during the National Reorganization Process. This restructuring included laying off personnel who were past their retirement age according to the agency's standards, and removing most of the personnel from the return to democracy under the Alfonsín administration.