THE “DEPARTMENT OF Government Efficiency” claimed to have saved the American taxpayer nearly $232 million by canceling an IT contract for the Social Security Administration.
They were only off by about $231 million.
In fact, the government cut only $560,000, a paltry savings generated by yet another Trump administration anti-trans attack: the elimination of a project to develop an “X” gender marker for the agency’s internal databases. The Social Security Administration Wednesday confirmed the discrepancy between the DOGE claims and the actual total, which was first uncovered by The Intercept.
DOGE’s mixed-up math came as no surprise to Dylan Hedtler-Gaudette, the director of government affairs at the Project on Government Oversight, who testified before the House DOGE subcommittee last weekabout the shortcomings of the Elon Musk effort.
“This, to me, is just part and parcel of the amateur-hour nature of what DOGE is doing,” he told The Intercept. “They’re going to destroy more than they help. It’s absolutely counterproductive.”
When Musk’s “Department of Governmental Efficiency” — officially the U.S. DOGE Service Temporary Organization — was first announced in November, it seemed like little more than a stunt. Immediately following Trump’s inauguration, however, the initiative sprang into action with murky processes and unclear outcomes. The Social Security contract snafu is just the latest example of confusion spread by Musk and DOGE as they boast of big cuts that vanish upon closer inspection.
On Monday, in response to criticisms from Democrats that the entity was not producing evidence to back up Musk’s extravagant claims of success, DOGE first posted its “wall of receipts,” an effort billed as follow-through on promises of transparency.
The rollout since then has been anything but smooth. On Tuesday, the New York Times reported that one claim of having saved $8 billion by axing a U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement contract was wildly incorrect, since the underlying contract only amounted to $8 million.
On Wednesday, other media outlets such as CNN picked apart DOGE’s claim to have saved $1.9 billion from USAID contracts — the hypothetical maximum of contracts that have so far only cost the government $55 million over several years.
It’s just a show for tv. Seen it already people think, been there, seen that. What’s new, entertain us, excite us, give us stories about his bad little boy. Sorry little son, you look the part and with a background like you have it’s 99.9 that you will turn out convoluted.
A cute dog and a cheeky, precocious son, that will catch the peeps and give them a taste of your fragrance.
Do we really care .The voters put Trump in power because the opposition put up a piss weak candidate. The rest of tye World are now getting a wake up call that they need to stand on their own 2 feet as Trump pulls the shutters down on cooperation and aid . A new force will arise from the shambles and America will suffer and turn on themselves like they did in the 19th century.
The US is far more focused on fighting the ‘enemy within’ and the right finally have the moment they’ve dreamed of for decades – the ability to dismantle the New Deal welfare state and the Keynesian economics at its core. The damage that is going to happen to the US economy is (for now) being massively under-estimated just as it was here in NZ – when the biggest investor and employer in your economy does mass layoffs and cuts spending your economy contracts and it contracts by multiples of the size of the cuts.
Doesn’t matter how big the tax cuts are they won’t make up for a cohesive and functional state and its primary role in providing infrastructure, healthcare, education and the regular creation and spending of the currency upon which the rest of the economy is built and depends.
In reality, people do care, there is a LOT of US opposition to Doge, and it’s growing, shown in angry public meetings (what the yanks call town-halls) and a mushrooming set of anti Doge lawsuits.
Musk is having to “lawyer up” big time.
Mr Bradbury, I agree with you. Well said.
I want to point and laugh when Elon finally figures out this doesn’t work and that he can’t go to Mars. Wake me up when he get there.
The bigger picture
This is class war. Richard Wolff:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oo_mjemEhLE
Irony. Elon Musk brandishing a chainsaw made in China.
Elon’s crashout is a perfect example of how money can’t buy happiness
Good. The more Ammurrica is hurt, the better for the human race.
Should name a crater on Mars after Musk, mass impact, widespread damage, a hole, a big hole.
It is prime time gut rot, merely fiddling the books to further burden the working class and enrich the billionaire mafia.