DOGE billed itself as a cost-cutter and instead burned roughly $9.5 billion paying more than 154,000 federal workers to sit home and do nothing. The promised $2 trillion in savings collapsed to $215 billion in unverified claims, and outside reviews put the real figure near half that. Agencies got hollowed out, services got worse and taxpayers ate the bill.
A department with 50 HR offices, 18 chief information officers and million-dollar contracts to study groundwater in Africa was never going to reform itself. More than $3 billion in wasteful contracts got canceled, only a small share of vacated jobs were refilled and fresh talent from outside government is an asset, not a liability. With debt past $40 trillion, quibbling over line items misses the point.
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