Government Efficiency (4 Viewers)

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    RobF

    RobF

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    I think this topic deserves its own thread, both to discuss generally the topic of government efficiency, and specifically the so-called 'Department of Government Efficiency' and the incoming Trump administration's aims to "dismantle Government Bureaucracy, slash excess regulations, cut wasteful expenditures and restructure Federal Agencies".

    The announcements have been covered in the The Trump Cabinet and key post thread, but to recap, Trump has announced that Elon Musk and Vivek Ramaswamy will work together on a not-actually-an-official-government-Department of Government Efficiency, which is intended to work with the White House and Office of Management & Budget to "drive large scale structural reform, and create an entrepreneurial approach to Government never seen before," with the 'Department' to conclude its work "no later than July 4, 2026."

    Musk has previously said that the federal budget could be reduced by "at least $2 trillion", and Ramaswarmy, during his presidential campaign, said he would fire more than 75% of the federal work force and disband agencies including the Department of Education and the FBI.
     
    Optimus Prime said:
    WASHINGTON (AP) — The Trump administration on Wednesday asked the Supreme Court to block court orders requiring Elon Musk ’s Department of Government Efficiency to turn over documents about its operations to a government watchdog group.

    The Justice Department’s latest emergency appeal to the high court concerns whether DOGE, which has been central to President Donald Trump’s push to remake the government, is a federal agency that is subject to the Freedom of Information Act. The administration argues DOGE is merely a presidential advisory body that is exempt from requests for documents under FOIA.

    The administration wants the justices to freeze orders that would force DOGE to turn over documents to Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington and have acting DOGE administrator Amy Gleason answer questions under oath within the next three weeks. CREW sued in February, claiming that DOGE “wields shockingly broad power” with no transparency about its actions.…..

    apnews.com

    Trump administration asks Supreme Court to block watchdog access to DOGE documents

    The Trump administration has asked the Supreme Court to block court orders requiring Elon Musk’s Department of Government Efficiency to turn over documents about its operations to a government watchdog group.
    apnews.com apnews.com
    Click to expand...
    Such a dishonest argument. DOGE is not advisory, they are calling the shots and everyone knows this. Various cabinet secretaries have said as much, IIRC.
     
    The Department of Veterans Affairs, the nation’s largest integrated healthcare system, has been plunged into crisis amid canceled contracts, hiring freezes, resignations, layoffs and other moves by the Trump administration and Elon Musk’s so-called “department of government efficiency” (Doge), internal agency documents obtained by the Guardian show.

    The documents paint a grim picture of chaos across the department’s sprawling network of 170 veterans affairs (VA) hospitals and more than 1,300 outpatient clinics, which serve 9 million US military veterans.

    At the Danville VA medical center, in rural Illinois near the Indiana border, so many nurses resigned that hospital administrators were forced to close the acute care unit to new patients.

    The dysfunction has also included a backlog of 2,298 unread radiology exams in Orlando, Florida, and the cancellation of a dozen rheumatology appointments in Montrose, New York. In Battle Creek, Michigan, a spate of resignations, early separation offers and a hiring freeze has led to a “critical” shortage of police officers responsible for protecting VA patients.


    The Guardian’s investigation, based on a review of “issue briefs” filed within the last month to the agency’s central office by staff at more than a dozen hospitals, comes at a time of increased scrutiny of the Trump administration’s handling of the VA.

    In response to a detailed list of findings from the Guardian, the VA press secretary Peter Kasperowicz argued the conditions described didn’t represent a problem.

    “The only thing these documents show is that VA has a robust and well functioning system to flag potential problems and quickly fix them,” he said in an email. “The Guardian’s attempt to spin these outdated, routine reports to make VA look bad is dishonest.”………..

    www.theguardian.com

    Disarray at Department of Veterans Affairs imperils patient care, internal documents reveal

    Unit closures, reduced hours of operation and exam backlogs reported after Trump administration reductions
    www.theguardian.com www.theguardian.com
     
    Workers hit by the Trump administration’s sweeping cuts of federal government jobs, programs and services turned to congressional Republicans for help. But Republicans don’t want to talk about it, according to people who have tried to reach the politicians.

    Sabrina Valenti, a former budget analyst for the Coastal Wetland Planning, Protection, and Restoration Act at the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (Noaa), was fired in February, then reinstated, and fired again weeks later.

    She started contacting Republicans in the Senate and the House of Representatives to express concern. “They represent hundreds of thousands or millions of people and those people deserve a safe and healthy life,” said Valenti. “They are allowing the people who create that safe and healthy life to be fired.”


    But as she worked with other fired federal workers in the Fork Off Coalition to reach members of Congress, the responses ranged “from indifference and being ignored to outright hostility”, Valenti claimed.

    Senators Josh Hawley and Chuck Grassley “just will not even look in our direction” in the hallways, she said. Hawley and Grassley’s offices did not respond to requests for comment.…….

    www.theguardian.com

    Republicans are dodging fired federal staff: ‘They will not even look in our direction’

    Members of Congress are accused of hiding out when workers have sought answers on why their jobs were axed
    www.theguardian.com www.theguardian.com
     
    Optimus Prime said:
    Workers hit by the Trump administration’s sweeping cuts of federal government jobs, programs and services turned to congressional Republicans for help. But Republicans don’t want to talk about it, according to people who have tried to reach the politicians.

    Sabrina Valenti, a former budget analyst for the Coastal Wetland Planning, Protection, and Restoration Act at the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (Noaa), was fired in February, then reinstated, and fired again weeks later.

    She started contacting Republicans in the Senate and the House of Representatives to express concern. “They represent hundreds of thousands or millions of people and those people deserve a safe and healthy life,” said Valenti. “They are allowing the people who create that safe and healthy life to be fired.”


    But as she worked with other fired federal workers in the Fork Off Coalition to reach members of Congress, the responses ranged “from indifference and being ignored to outright hostility”, Valenti claimed.

    Senators Josh Hawley and Chuck Grassley “just will not even look in our direction” in the hallways, she said. Hawley and Grassley’s offices did not respond to requests for comment.…….

    www.theguardian.com

    Republicans are dodging fired federal staff: ‘They will not even look in our direction’

    Members of Congress are accused of hiding out when workers have sought answers on why their jobs were axed
    www.theguardian.com www.theguardian.com
    Click to expand...
    Fork off indeed.
     
    Although Elon Musk said Doge didn’t cut Aids programs, global health officials describe widespread and disastrous effects resulting from the White House’s throttling of foreign aid.

    The disruptions have caused new HIV infections to surge in recent months and threaten to derail plans to eradicate the virus as a public health threat by 2030.

    In one stark case, the cuts have cast uncertainty over the rollout of a newly developed injectable that scientists have hailed as “the closest thing to a vaccine that we have ever had in HIV response”.

    Musk was projected 10ft tall above the stage at the Qatar Economic Forum this week as he gave a sweeping and combative video interview.

    The creator of the so-called “department of government efficiency”, who once boasted he had fed “USAID into the wood chipper”, found himself defending his cuts to humanitarian aid. Just days before, Bill Gates had accused the world’s richest person of “killing the world’s poorest children”.

    In one especially fraught exchange with Bloomberg interviewer Mishal Husain, Musk rebuked a question about whether his cuts to USAID had imperiled HIV/Aids programs and claimed he would “fix it right now” if any services had, in fact, been defunded.

    “First of all, the program, the Aids medication program, is continuing. So, your fundamental premise is wrong. It is continuing,” Musk said. “It is false. It’s false. It’s false.”

    Rather than Musk’s cuts leaving HIV/Aids programs intact, however, global health officials said that Doge’s efforts have in reality hampered their work worldwide and thrown the protection of large swaths of people from disease into disarray…….

    www.theguardian.com

    Elon Musk says Doge didn’t cut HIV programs. But it threw a ‘miracle drug’ into chaos

    Global health officials say USAID cuts upended their work, as billionaire claims he will fix any defunding ‘right now’
    www.theguardian.com www.theguardian.com
     
    Nobody in the press should print anything this administration says without the disclaimer that they are proven liars. It should be beside every quote until people get sick of seeing it.
     
    www.democracydocket.com

    Judge Says Musk Must Face Lawsuit Over His Role In DOGE

    Read more here.
    www.democracydocket.com www.democracydocket.com

    1748446364076.png
     
    efil4 said:
    No wonder Musk exited stage left as quickly as he showed up and professing publicly his time as DOGE director is over. ( to focus more on his companies )

    too late.
    Click to expand...

    Also, he was always an SGE (special government employee) - the max he can serve is 130 days. Beyond that he has to become a full federal employee with the various disclosures and compliance that goes with it.

    If you do the math, he started pretty much right away - let's call it January 21, 2025. So exactly 130 days from January 21, 2025 is June 1, 2025.
     
    Throwing up his hands in disgust and abruptly resigning was not how Mark Nebel envisioned he would end his long career with the National Park Service. He loved his job at the Grand Canyon, where he had worked for 15 years.

    As manager of the park’s geosciences program, Nebel, 68, oversaw efforts to protect its geology and paleontology as well as monitoring water sources, air quality and the effects of climate change.

    He had planned to stay in his position at least five more years before retiring. There was still much research to do to support the vulnerable ecosystems in one of the world’s greatest natural wonders.

    But after Donald Trump took office, Nebel’s rewarding job turned into a bottomless pit of frustrations.

    As “department of government efficiency” (Doge) staff embedded themselves in the National Park Service on their hunt for “waste, fraud and abuse”, Nebel says his program – which works closely with universities, non-profits and Native American tribes – became hamstrung.

    “They made it impossible to do agreements with outside organizations, uphold contracts, purchase the tools we needed or send samples out to a lab for analysis,” he says. “And we were supposed to stop talking about climate change.”

    He and his staff were also experiencing constant emotional stress. So Nebel made the tough decision to retire early to protect his health. “It was incredibly difficult and heartbreaking,” he says.

    “But I was tired of being manipulated, humiliated and unable to do the work that I was hired to do for the American people.”

    Famously described as “America’s best idea” by the writer Wallace Stegner, the US national park system encompasses 85m acres with units in all 50 states, ranging from crown jewels such as the Grand Canyon and Yellowstone to national battlefields and tiny historic sites.

    The system is almost universally beloved; a recent Pew surveyfound it was, at 76%, the most-approved-of federal agency. And it seems to only grow more popular, hosting a record 331 million visitors last year.

    It is also a reliable economic engine for rural communities across the country, generating billions of dollars in tourism spending.

    But this summer, the mood inside the parks is bleak. Interviews with more than a dozen current and former National Park Service employees paint a picture of turmoil and fear – the result of unprecedented staff reductions, untenable new rules and proposed funding cuts to the tune of more than $1bn.

    Adding to this anxiety is a decision by the US interior secretary, Doug Burgum, to give Tyler Hassen, a former oil company executive working for Doge, broad administrative authority over the Department of Interior, which oversees the national park system.….

    www.theguardian.com

    Turmoil, resignations and ‘psychological warfare’: how Trump is crippling US national parks

    As the administration slashes jobs and hobbles research, current and former workers say the mood inside US national parks – described as America’s ‘best idea’ – is bleak
    www.theguardian.com www.theguardian.com
     
    Secretary of State Marco Rubio: “No one has died because of USAID —”

    Rep. Brad Sherman (D-California): “The people who have died …”

    Rubio: “That’s a lie.”

    — exchange at a congressional hearing, May 21

    “That question about people dying around the world is an unfair one.”
    — Rubio, at another congressional hearing later that day

    When Rubio testified last week about the State Department budget, Sherman confronted him about numerous anecdotal accounts of people around the world dying because the Trump administration, at the direction of billionaire Elon Musk, dismantled the U.S. Agency for International Development and shut down many of its programs.

    Sherman used his time mainly to pontificate, and Rubio’s attention must have wandered. He asked Sherman to repeat the question after Sherman said: “We next focus on USAID. Musk gutted it. He said no one died as a result. Do you agree no one had died yet as a result of the chainsawing of USAID? Yes or no.”

    Sherman repeated: “Has anyone died in the world because of what Elon Musk did?”

    Rubio stumbled a response — “Uh, listen” — and Sherman cut him off. “Yes or no?” he said. “Reclaiming my time. If you won’t answer, that’s a loud answer.”

    That’s when Rubio said it was “a lie.” As Sherman’s staff held up photos of people alleged to have died because they stopped receiving services from USAID programs, Rubio denounced the claim as “false.”

    Later in the day, at another hearing, Rep. Grace Meng (D-New York) gave Rubio an opportunity to clean up his statement. “Do you stand behind that testimony?” she asked. “And has there been any assessment conducted by the department to this point of how many people have died?”

    Rubio said it was “an unfair question.” He tried to reframe the question, arguing that other countries such as Britain and France also have cut back on humanitarian spending, while China has never contributed much.

    “The United States is the largest humanitarian provider on the planet,” he said. “I would argue: How many people die because China hasn’t done it? How many people have died because the U.K. has cut back on spending and so has other countries?”

    There’s a lot to unpack there..............

    Rubio’s claim that it’s ‘a lie’ that people have died from foreign-aid cuts​


     
    Optimus Prime said:
    Secretary of State Marco Rubio: “No one has died because of USAID —”

    Rep. Brad Sherman (D-California): “The people who have died …”

    Rubio: “That’s a lie.”

    — exchange at a congressional hearing, May 21

    “That question about people dying around the world is an unfair one.”
    — Rubio, at another congressional hearing later that day

    When Rubio testified last week about the State Department budget, Sherman confronted him about numerous anecdotal accounts of people around the world dying because the Trump administration, at the direction of billionaire Elon Musk, dismantled the U.S. Agency for International Development and shut down many of its programs.

    Sherman used his time mainly to pontificate, and Rubio’s attention must have wandered. He asked Sherman to repeat the question after Sherman said: “We next focus on USAID. Musk gutted it. He said no one died as a result. Do you agree no one had died yet as a result of the chainsawing of USAID? Yes or no.”

    Sherman repeated: “Has anyone died in the world because of what Elon Musk did?”

    Rubio stumbled a response — “Uh, listen” — and Sherman cut him off. “Yes or no?” he said. “Reclaiming my time. If you won’t answer, that’s a loud answer.”

    That’s when Rubio said it was “a lie.” As Sherman’s staff held up photos of people alleged to have died because they stopped receiving services from USAID programs, Rubio denounced the claim as “false.”

    Later in the day, at another hearing, Rep. Grace Meng (D-New York) gave Rubio an opportunity to clean up his statement. “Do you stand behind that testimony?” she asked. “And has there been any assessment conducted by the department to this point of how many people have died?”

    Rubio said it was “an unfair question.” He tried to reframe the question, arguing that other countries such as Britain and France also have cut back on humanitarian spending, while China has never contributed much.

    “The United States is the largest humanitarian provider on the planet,” he said. “I would argue: How many people die because China hasn’t done it? How many people have died because the U.K. has cut back on spending and so has other countries?”

    There’s a lot to unpack there..............

    Rubio’s claim that it’s ‘a lie’ that people have died from foreign-aid cuts​


    Click to expand...
    That is such weaseling I’m amazed it wasn’t Ted Cruz.
     
    Employees of Elon Musk’s “department of government efficiency” (Doge) own lucrative stock in companies that stand to directly benefit from their work gutting federal agencies, Democratic senators have alleged.

    The potential ethics violations merit an investigation by the justice department and other oversight bodies, urges a letter co-authored by senators Elizabeth Warren of Massachusetts, Ron Wyden of Oregon and Jack Reed of Rhode Island and obtained by the Guardian.

    “We write regarding new reports that Doge employees at the treasury, Internal Revenue Service (IRS), and the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB) have been engaged in the dismantling of these agencies while holding hundreds of thousands of dollars of stock in private companies benefitting from these individuals’ efforts to eliminate key programs, staff, and policies,” the senators state.

    Doge was launched in January with a mission to cut wasteful spending, slash federal regulations and improve government software and IT systems.

    It has about 79 appointed employees and 10 seconded from other agencies. Many are young software engineers who worked for Musk’s companies and have no prior government experience.

    Recent media reports have alleged that their actions aligned with the financial interests of the companies in which they held stock.

    This could constitute violations of an ethics law that prohibits federal employees from participating in matters in which they have a personal financial interest.

    A wilful violation of this law carries penalties including fines and imprisonment.

    Warren and her Senate colleagues argue: “This poses a clear conflict of interest and potential criminal violation of federal ethics law, which bars any federal government employee from participat[ing] personally and substantially … [in any] particular matter in which [they] … ha[ve] a financial interest.”

    The letter – addressed to Pam Bondi, the attorney general, as well as Jamieson Greer, acting director of the Office of Government Ethics, and inspectors general within the Treasury, IRS and Federal Reserve – details three specific cases.

    Tom Krause, the Doge team leader at Treasury, reportedly holds substantial stock in major financial institutions – including JPMorgan Chase and Bank of America – that do business with or provide services to Treasury.

    He also owns shares in the tech giants Google, Oracle and Amazon while leading treasury’s IT modernisation efforts. A government ethics expert described this to Politico as “a massive, glaring red flag of a conflict of interest”.

    Krause, Todd Newnam and Linda Whitridge of the treasury Doge team reportedly own shares in Intuit (parent of TurboTax), a company actively opposing the IRS’s free tax filing programme Direct File.

    The letter notes that Musk had previously claimed to have “deleted” a team involved in Direct File development.

    The senators find it “deeply disturbing if Doge employees with a financial stake in Intuit were involved with overseeing and dismantling the Direct File initiative”.……..

    www.theguardian.com

    Doge employees hold stock in firms set to benefit from cuts, Democrats allege

    Elizabeth Warren and others urge investigation over ‘clear conflict of interest and potential criminal violation’
    www.theguardian.com www.theguardian.com
     

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