Via The Hill: What a Trump-Musk Government Efficiency Department Should Do in Its First 100 Days
President Trump announced that Elon Musk and Vivek Ramaswamy will co-lead the Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) aimed at exposing fraudulent and wasteful spending across federal agencies. Last year alone, the federal government sent a whopping $236 billion in improper payments to individuals or entities that, according to the Government Accountability Office, were ineligible to receive such payments.
Earlier this week, Dan Lips, head of policy at the Foundation for American Innovation, published a piece in The Hill highlighting potential avenues Musk and Ramaswamy could take to start reversing the Biden-Harris Administration’s billions in improper payments. The House Budget Committee is leading the charge on how to improve government efficiency and ensure the proper stewardship of taxpayer dollars.
Word on the Street:
Dan Lips, Via The Hill:
- “After campaigning with Elon Musk to establish a Department of Government Efficiency, President-elect Donald Trump now has a national mandate to disrupt the federal bureaucracy, achieve substantial taxpayer savings, and make the government more accountable to the American people. After spending $950 billion on interest on the national debt this year, immediate action to achieve cost savings must be a top priority in 2025.”
- “First, direct federal agencies to take immediate action to implement open watchdog recommendations to save up to $208 billion. Today, the nonpartisan Government Accountability Office reports more than 5,200 open recommendations for federal agencies to make the government work better. In July, GAO estimated taxpayers could save between $106 billion and $208 billion if all of these recommendations were implemented.”
- “The Inspectors General have another 14,000 recommendations for government efficiency, which would yield additional savings if addressed. Directing federal agency heads to review and implement through executive action all efficiency-related open recommendations would likely yield hundreds of billions in savings.”
- “Second, submit a legislative reform package to Congress to enact watchdog recommendations for the legislative branch. Not all of GAO’s recommendations can be implemented by the executive branch. Some require changes in law. Today, more than 200 of GAO’s recommendations made to Congress remain open. Many of these recommendations identify opportunities for potential taxpayers’ savings, such as a reform to Medicare payment rates that could save $141 billion over a decade. Altogether, enacting GAO’s recommendations for Congress could save nearly $200 billion. The Trump administration should submit to Congress a legislative package to enact all of these cost-savings reforms.”
- “Third, start a government-wide initiative to achieve immediate regulatory relief, harmonization, and streamlining. Trump will likely issue an executive order restoring his regulatory policy of “one in, two out” to curb the growth of federal red tape. This would be a good move, but the White House can do even more. It should pursue regulatory harmonization and clean-up initiatives and continue some of the Biden administration’s better policies on this front.”
- “It could promote economic growth and opportunity by maintaining the public benefits of regulations while reducing compliance costs. The Trump administration should also extend the Health and Human Services Department’s “Regulatory Clean Up Initiative,” which began in 2020 and involves using artificial intelligence to review federal code and policy guidance to identify areas for regulatory streamlining.”
- “The White House should direct federal agencies to begin planning for AI’s adoption in the workforce, including by identifying barriers to federal agencies’ use of AI.”
- “Fifth, initiate a comprehensive review of the federal budget to identify duplicative or outdated programs. The first four recommendations can be done immediately to set in motion substantial short- and long-term cost savings. Over a longer timeline, Trump’s efficiency program should undertake the hard work of reviewing all federal programs and activities to identify programs that are duplicative, outdated or unnecessary. For example, GAO has saved more than $660 billion in taxpayer dollars by spotlighting duplicative programs over the last 13 years.”
- “The Congressional Budget Office recently found that Congress provided more than $500 billion in appropriations last year to programs that had expired under federal law. Conducting a comprehensive review to identify wasteful or outdated programs could yield savings or spur congressional action to update programs to make them work better for the American people.”
- “President Trump and Musk will surely have a bold vision for what can be accomplished by a Department of Government Efficiency, including broad reforms, reorganizations, and cuts to the federal budget. But these straightforward actions in the first 100 days could achieve hundreds of billions in savings in the short term and create valuable momentum for a four-year project to transform the federal government.”
The Bottom Line:
The DOGE is a tremendous step in leadership from President Trump toward fiscal responsibility to combat the nearly $36 trillion in unsustainable debt. Americans deserve to be able to trust their government and hold authorities accountable through transparency.
Chairman Arrington and the House Budget Committee are leading the charge to rein-in federal spending while simultaneously improving the nation’s budgetary outlook.
