One of the most controversial proposals from Elon Musk’s Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) is gaining support as he and lawmakers look to cut costs.
President-elect Donald Trump has tapped the Tesla CEO and entrepreneur Vivek Ramaswamy to cut trillions of dollars in federal spending as the U.S. national debt continues to balloon to staggering new highs inflated by runaway expenditures over the few last decades.
As it stands, that debt totals $36.2 trillion dollars, but Musk estimates that DOGE could cut ‘at least $2 trillion’ from the current White House’s $6.5 trillion budget in the near term.
The next natural questions is where should these cuts will come from. Musk and Ramaswamy are reportedly considering stripping all taxpayer-funded foreign aid, which would send shock waves internationally.
The United States spent an estimated $70 billion in foreign aid in fiscal year 2022 to help economic development and humanitarian causes and other interests.
And America has allotted a whopping $175 billion total in foreign aid to Ukraine alone since the outbreak of its war with Russia in 2022.
But the spigots spewing U.S. taxpayer dollars abroad may soon be turned off.
South Carolina Republican Rep. Ralph Norman told DailyMail.com DOGE ‘absolutely’ should target foreign aid, though he admitted slashing funding to Israel is off the table.
House Oversight Committee Chair James Comer, R-Ky., similarly told DailyMail.com that ‘foreign aid for every country except Israel’ should be cut.
Elon Musk met with lawmakers on Capitol Hill last week to speak about DOGE initiatives
Former Texas Rep. Ron Paul asked to help DOGE with its cost cutting efforts, Musk agreed that he could help advise the team
A search and rescue operation is underway after a Russian missile strike, Zaporizhzhia, southeastern Ukraine on December 10, 2024. Paul and Musk have both called for eliminating foreign aid to countries like Ukraine and elsewhere to help achieve DOGE’s cost saving goals
‘Here’s an easy one for @DOGE !’ three-time presidential candidate and former lawmaker Ron Paul posted on X recently. ‘Eliminate foreign aid!’
‘It’s taking money from the poor and middle class in the US and giving it to the rich in poor countries – with a cut to the facilitators in between! Americans don’t want their government to borrow more money to spend on foreign aid,’ the post continued.
‘Besides, it is the immoral transfer of wealth and is unconstitutional.’
Musk has posted about the libertarian: ‘Would be great to have Ron Paul as part of the Department of Government Efficiency!’
Democrats, however, bristle at DOGE’s sweeping mandate, and the thought of unraveling expenditures approved by Congress.
‘Well, I think $2 trillion is an unrealistic figure,’ Rep. Steny Hoyer, D-Md., told DailyMail.com of DOGE’s objective.
At 85-years-old Hoyer is one of the longest serving congressmen first joined the House in 1981. During that year the national debt sat at $988 billion, a modest number compared to today’s jaw-dropping $36 trillion.
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky (C) posing for a picture with servicemen holding a Ukrainian flag. The U.S. has sent nearly $200 billion dollars to the country in recent years
President Joe Biden has repeatedly urged Congress to pass additional funding for Ukraine. He is reportedly planning on pushing for an additional $1 billion to the country soon
The veteran Maryland Democrat was not optimistic that the Musk-led initiative would create meaningful cuts, and he seemed opposed to lessening the scope of government.
Hoyer said he would urge DOGE only to cut things ‘that can be affected without adversely affecting the services that people need and that the Congress has voted for.’
But most lawmakers were keen on other ways to whittle down waste too.
‘So the whole key to me is pick the low hanging fruit, the DEI things comes to mind, transgender surgeries, all that kind of things,’ Norman floated as quick DOGE targets.
‘The Farm Bill’s SNAP, look at the waste that’s going there,’ he added about the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, commonly referred to as food stamps.
The food subsidy program costed the U.S. roughly $115 billion in 2023, per federal data.
‘Every government agency has created new grant programs,’ Comer said. ‘We’ve got all this money and energy spending on solar and wind and energy initiatives in the green New Deal that people don’t think are working out.’
‘We spent all this money to run broadband, yet nobody’s hooked on to the broadband,’ he added. ‘The list goes on and on and on of money that has just been absolutely wasted, all this money spent on charging stations, and yet no charging stations were built.’
He said funding could be taken from agency’s whose usefulness has also been diminished over time, like the United States Postal Service.
Rep. Rich McCormick, R-Ga., a physician, suggested that DOGE look into cutting Medicare and Medicaid fraud, which he says would cut hundreds of billions of dollars in government spending over the next 10 years.
The U.S. has recently approved Ukraine to use its advanced HIMARS weapons system to attack deep in Russian territory
Republicans were against slashing foreign aid funding for Israel despite being open to cutting the funding for Ukraine and other nations
Medicaid fraud $413 billion in the next 10 years,’ he said, arguing that reforms in this sector would make far more meaningful spending cuts than suspending foreign aid payments.
‘At least with foreign investment you don’t end up isolationist,’ he told DailyMail.com. ‘Every isolationist country in history has gone the way of the dodo,’ he said referring to the extinct bird.
The Republican claimed that adding income verification for the federal health programs would immediately cut cost.
‘If you want to talk about waste, fraud and abuse on the way we do claims … we spent 25 percent of every dollar spent on health care, actually it’s more than that now, on administrative costs.’
‘We can modify this without a lot of pain,’ he said with a smile.