On Thursday, Elon Musk and Republican presidential candidate Vivek Ramaswamy will visit Capitol Hill to discuss their newly-established advisory team, which aims to cut federal regulations, spending, and headcounts. This initiative, named the Department of Government Efficiency (or “Doge”), was first introduced by Donald Trump last month and marks a new chapter in efforts to streamline government operations. The name “Doge” seems to nod to Musk’s preferred cryptocurrency, dogecoin.
What We Know About Doge
Despite the ambitious name, Doge is not a government department. It isn’t established by an act of Congress, nor does it have the vast staff that a government department typically requires. Rather, Doge is an advisory body, with Musk and Ramaswamy acting as “outside volunteers” rather than federal officials or employees. Their job is to help the Trump transition team build the Doge team, which will guide the White House on spending cuts and find regulations they think are exceeding agencies’ legal authority.
Musk and Ramaswamy outlined their plan in an opinion piece for the Wall Street Journal: “DOGE will present this list of regulations to President Trump, who can, by executive action, immediately pause the enforcement of those regulations and initiate the process for review and rescission.”
Big Cuts on the Agenda
Musk and Ramaswamy are adamant about reforming the federal bureaucracy, which they have called an “existential threat to our republic.” They promise that Doge will not be like other advisory bodies that produce reports but fail to enact real change. “We’ll cut costs,” they wrote, emphasizing that their focus is on tangible outcomes. Musk said he could identify over $2 trillion in savings, which would be around a third of the federal government’s annual budget. It includes slashing regulations, allowing mass layoffs, and shutting down some of the government agencies.
Ramaswamy, who has campaigned for the Republican presidential nomination, has been quite vocal about his plans to abolish the Education Department, the FBI, and the IRS, promises he repeated at a Mar-a-Lago rally last month. “Elon doesn’t bring a chisel, he brings a chainsaw,” Ramaswamy declared, promising that the approach would be “a lot of fun.”
Musk has solicited volunteers on X (formerly Twitter), where job applicants are encouraged to email their resumes to the new Doge account. The work will be long hours—work 80+ hours per week—and unpaid. Musk called the work “tedious,” saying it would “make lots of enemies” and that “compensation is zero.” Only the “top 1% of applicants” will be considered.
The Doge effort has a cut-off date: July 4, 2026—a date that Trump framed as a boon to the nation on the eve of its 250th anniversary. Some of his supporters are keeping their fingers crossed that Doge will have the Grace Commission effect that some private initiative launched by President Ronald Reagan in 1982 had a decade earlier—offering, in fact, over 2,500 reforms—most of which were never implemented.
Experts Skeptical
Critics have raised serious questions about the feasibility of Musk and Ramaswamy’s ambitious agenda. “Insane,” declared Elaine Kamarck, a senior fellow at the Brookings Institution, when she referred to Musk’s plan to cut a third of the federal budget. “Mandatory spending—Social Security and Medicare—makes up around two-thirds of the budget,” she added. “This is the first warning sign that this is going to be a failed operation,” Kamarck said.
But Doge has also received some unexpected praise. Senator Bernie Sanders, an independent from Vermont, agreed with Musk’s call for defense budget cuts, pointing out that the Pentagon has failed its audit seven times in a row and lost track of billions. Representative Ro Khanna of California, a Democrat, echoed the sentiment, supporting cuts to Pentagon spending. Additionally, Florida Representative Jared Moskowitz is now the first Democrat to join the House Doge caucus, which advocates for less spending by the government. “Reducing ineffective government spending should not be a partisan issue,” Moskowitz stated.
ALSO READ: Russia’s Lavrov And The US’s Blinken To Meet At OSCE In Malta, Ukraine War On The Agenda
