Posted on Friday, May 30, 2025
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by Alan Jamison
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12 Comments
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With Elon Musk leaving his role as head of the Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE), the Trump administration and Republicans in Congress are working swiftly to codify the spending cuts that the agency has made over the past few months.
President Donald Trump appointed Musk as a “special government employee” to lead DOGE at the beginning of his second term. Special government employees are positions appointed by the president that can only last up to 130 days. For Musk, those 130 days expire this week with Friday being his last day. He will still continue to serve as an unofficial adviser to Trump outside the administration.
“As my scheduled time as a Special Government Employee comes to an end, I would like to thank President @realDonaldTrump for the opportunity to reduce wasteful spending,” Musk posted on X. “The @DOGE mission will only strengthen over time as it becomes a way of life throughout the government.”
The Trump administration now plans to send a first “rescissions package” to Congress as early as next week to codify into law $9.4 billion of cuts DOGE has identified. This bill would allow the administration to block funding that Congress has already allocated for the year. Congress will have 45 days to consider the bill before it is voided.
Cuts in the package include $1.1 billion from the Corporation for Public Broadcasting (CPB) and $8.3 billion from foreign aid. The effort to defund CPB would hit taxpayer-funded media organizations such as NPR and PBS, while the effort to defund foreign aid would hit USAID and the scandal-rocked African Development Foundation.
“We want to make sure that Congress passes its first rescissions bill, and we will send more if they pass it,” Office of Management and Budget (OMB) Director Russ Vought said on Fox Business. “And so, this is the first one. It’s foreign aid, USAID cuts, many of the waste and garbage that was funded – not only wasteful but hurting our foreign policy.”
Speaker Mike Johnson explained in a post on X that he will work to ensure the bill passes the House. He said that Musk and DOGE “have done INCREDIBLE work exposing waste, fraud, and abuse across the federal government.”
After the White House sends Congress the rescissions package, the first order of business will be for the House to “act quickly by passing legislation to codify the cuts.” Johnson added that the House has built on DOGE’s work with the “One Big Beautiful Bill” that the chamber passed last week. This is the reconciliation bill that includes much of Trump’s agenda.
“The House made sure to build on DOGE’s success within the One Big Beautiful Bill,” Johnson explained on X. “[White House Deputy Chief of Staff Stephen Miller] has made an important point about the two efforts: DOGE found savings in discretionary spending (such as funding agencies), while our One Big Beautiful Bill secured over $1.6 trillion in savings in mandatory spending (such as Medicaid).”
DOGE has identified $175 billion in wasteful spending so far, amounting to $1,086.96 per taxpayer.
With Musk’s departure from the White House, Americans will be closely watching DOGE and Congress for continued movement on eliminating government waste. Musk was undoubtedly the driving force behind the movement. But as he said, the mission is far from over. The onus is now on Congress to ensure that the waste, fraud, and abuse DOGE identified does not creep back into federal agencies.
Alan Jamison is the pen name of a political writer with extensive experience writing for several notable politicians and news outlets.
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