DOGE's road to saving $2 trillion starts with an unexpected order
Whatever Elon Musk's Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) was supposed to be, on Monday it apparently took a new form altogether β a federal office with deep influence over the government's digital infrastructure.
Why it matters: Once explicitly envisioned as an out-of-government vehicle to cut $2 trillion from the budget, slash federal jobs, reduce waste and streamline bureaucracy, DOGE is instead starting with an apparent pivot to Musk's bread-and-butter: software development.
The big picture: "First buddy" Musk has spent the last two months promising DOGE would revolutionize the government.
- It's unclear how the new mandate to run a "Software Modernization Initiative" will deliver on that promise.
- But as the Washington Post reported this week, it does streamline the DOGE mission into what Musk was interested in all along, as opposed to the slash-and-burn his former co-leader Vivek Ramaswamy envisioned.
- As the Wall Street Journal reported, Musk's vision won out, while Ramaswamy's tendency to have a public hot take on virtually any subject wore thin his welcome in Trumpworld.
Driving the news: President Trump signed an executive order Monday night formally establishing DOGE.
- It renames the U.S. Digital Service the U.S. DOGE Service and puts it under the Executive Office of the President β effectively making a federal entity of what was previously described as an outside-of-government operation.
- "This Executive Order establishes the Department of Government Efficiency to implement the President's DOGE Agenda, by modernizing Federal technology and software to maximize governmental efficiency and productivity," the order reads.
- The new USDS will have an administrator (not yet named), who reports to the White House chief of staff. It will also have a "Temporary Organization" whose mandate of advancing Trump's agenda expires July 4, 2026 - the 250th anniversary of the Declaration of Independence.
- The order requires that each federal agency establish a DOGE Team with a team leader, an engineer, an HR specialist and an attorney.
- It also instructs that the new USDS get "full and prompt access to all unclassified agency records, software systems, and IT systems."
Flashback: The U.S. Digital Service itself is the legacy of an earlier "Silicon Valley meets Washington" effort under President Obama, when software-savvy tech experts flooded D.C. to rescue the troubled Obamacare website and stuck around to help modernize systems across government.
- It's been lauded for its achievements, though it's not clear which (if any) of its efforts will survive the DOGE transition.
The intrigue: Musk's depth of software experience is well known.
- But he also has extensive business with the government, and intricate personal finances, complicating the prospect of working with a White House office at the same time.
- He also reportedly lacks some security clearances, which could throw a wrench into DOGE's work in some parts of government.
- DOGE is already facing lawsuits about what kinds of disclosures it does or doesn't have to make, and intended co-leader Ramaswamy (the more public advocate on the efficiency push) has left.
- The White House did not return calls for comment.
π Ben's thought bubble: DOGE's new structure is not what anyone expected, and raises plenty of new questions no one's yet answering: Is this all that's planned? What does Musk gain from such unfettered access to so much government data? And can better software really save $2 trillion a year?
Scott Rosenberg contributed.