DOGE Findings

[Laodicean60]

'Savings' claims were off from the start

This true.

 

[DaisyDay]

What has DOGE done in Trump's first 100 days?​

'Savings' claims were off from the start​

There's little evidence to support the claim that DOGE is saving agencies significant money or changing the fact that the federal government spends more money than it collects — mainly on non-discretionary programs like Medicaid and Social Security. In fact, as of March 31, government spending is up 10% from the same period last year while revenue is only up 3%, leading to a 23% increase in the deficit, according to Treasury Department data.

Even after Musk's latest downward revision of DOGE's savings goal to $150 billion, that number is unlikely to be reached.

On its website, DOGE claims $160 billion has been saved through canceling contracts, firing workers and other measures. As NPR has reported, that tracker is plagued with inaccuracies, errors, omissions and overstatements.

As of late April, out of $160 billion in claimed savings, DOGE's "wall of receipts" has data to account to just $63 billion in purported claims.

The five contract cancellations with the most claimed savings, accounting for nearly $7.5 billion in the DOGE tracker, actually amount to just under $1 billion in potential savings. They include a contract that was never awarded, one that was already terminated and another that doesn't appear to be canceled at all, as DOGE continues to use misleading math.

I have a feeling that when all is said and done, this will have cost us a fortune, not just in lost functionality, but the analysis and repair just of the civil service section not to mention all the coming suits for cancelled contracts which will still need to be paid eventually.

 

[A2SG]

Who knew using a chainsaw to balance a budget would be so hard?

-- A2SG, and it seemed like such a good idea at the time....

 

[essentialsaltes]

Republicans are telling the White House that DOGE cuts will not be permanent​

Conservatives have faced furious opposition from their constituents during town hall meetings in their districts

Congressional Republicans have said in private conversations that it would be a stretch to codify even a small part of the cuts put in place by Musk, according to The Washington Post.

Both the courts and Congress are refusing to legally protect the cuts pushed through by Musk, and the White House has few options to ensure the reductions have a lasting effect.

The White House suggested sending a small share of the DOGE cuts for congressional approval — $9.3 billion of cuts, primarily handling the removal of the foreign aid agency, the U.S. Agency for International Development, the remains of which have been folded into the State Department. Those cuts would also include cutbacks to funding for public broadcasting.​

 

[essentialsaltes]

Elon Musk’s DOGE Deletes Dozens of Claims of Cost-Cutting After Investigation Reveals They Are False​

Elon Musk’s so-called Department of Government Efficiency deleted over 30 different government contracts from its website’s “Wall of Receipts” this week after a New York Times investigation found them to still be active.

[separate from that...]

In late April, the Partnership for Public Service (PSP) found that from the $160 billion DOGE had claimed to save the federal government, some additional $130 billion would need to be spent. The nonpartisan research group came up with the sum by calculating the “costs associated with putting tens of thousands of federal employees on paid leave, re-hiring mistakenly fired workers and lost productivity,” reported CBS News at the time.

 

[essentialsaltes]

DOGE went looking for phone fraud at SSA — and found almost none​

The anti-fraud tool set up last month after weeks of changes to the agency’s telephone policies has slowed retirement claim processing by 25% and led to a "degradation of public service,” according to an internal May document obtained by Nextgov/FCW that examined potentially cutting the anti-fraud tool for phone claims.

Under the new policy, the agency found that only two benefit claims out of over 110,000 had a high probability of being fraudulent — and they aren’t guaranteed to be so.

[That's 0.0018%]

Aram Moghaddassi, a DOGE engineer, notably said during a March 27 interview on Fox News that 40% of phone calls made to SSA to change direct deposit information come from fraudsters.

The agency itself has said that, in actuality, 40% of direct deposit fraud at the agency is associated with phone calls, not that 40% of all calls regarding changes to bank information are made by fraudsters.

Musk repeated a similar claim that 40% of the agency’s calls were “fraudulent” during a speech in late March.

Vice President J.D. Vance has also repeated this talking point — following it by saying “DOGE has got a lot of work to do”

"Every one of DOGE’s so-called ‘mistakes’ is a backdoor cut to people’s benefits,” [senator Warren] said. “There’s nothing efficient about making it harder for people to access the checks they’ve earned and are owed.”