Since returning to the White House, President Donald Trump has wasted little time sending his newly created Department of Government Efficiency after federal agencies. On his first day in office, Trump signed an executive order officially creating DOGE. With billionaire SpaceX and Tesla CEO Elon Musk at the helm as a “special government employee,” the group has taken swift action toward its stated goal of rooting out government fraud, waste, and abuse of taxpayer dollars. Here’s a list of the agencies and initiatives DOGE has targeted so far.
National Aeronautics and Space Administration
While at the Commerce Space Conference in Washington DC on February 12, the space agency’s acting administrator said that NASA was expecting a visit from DOGE. “So we are a federal agency. We are going to have DOGE come. They are going to look — similarly to what they’ve done at other agencies — at our payments,” said Janet Petro, in comments reported by Bloomberg. NASA has done quite a lot of business with Musk’s own space company, SpaceX, amounting to around $14.5 billion in contracts between the two.
Department of Education
Trump has repeatedly said he wants to shut down the Department of Education. On February 12, he told reporters that he wants the department closed “immediately,” adding that it “is a big con job.” Along with some GOP lawmakers, Trump has said that education should be handled at the state and local level, and that a federal agency isn’t necessary. On February 12, DOGE said that it had cancelled a number of DOE contracts — including a “$4.6M contract to coordinate zoom and in-person meetings,” a “$3.0M contract to write a report that showed that prior reports were not utilized by schools,” and a “$1.4M contract to physically observe mailing and clerical operations.” The cost-cutting group has also said that it has terminated 89 contracts at the DOE, totaling $881 million. What’s next for the department is still unclear, but Trump has said that he wants his pick for education secretary, Linda McMahon, to put herself out of a job.
DEI Initiatives
On January 31, just 11 days into its existence, DOGE announced it had terminated 104 government contracts related to DEIA (diversity, equity, inclusion, and accessibility) programs and initiatives.
DOGE said the cuts — spanning 30 agencies including the Federal Aviation Administration, Department of Veterans Affairs, Office of Personnel Management, Environmental Protection Agency, and many more — created over $1 billion in savings.
US Agency for International Development
Musk has been working to shut down the US Agency for International Development, which funds humanitarian efforts around the world. As the world’s largest provider of humanitarian aid, the US channeled nearly $32.5 billion through the agency in 2024, providing aid to countries like Ukraine, Jordan, and Ethiopia. In a post on X on February 3, Musk accused the agency of being a “criminal organization” and said he “spent the weekend feeding USAID into the wood chipper.” Hours later, USAID workers were told to stay home from work, and within days, the agency announced that all direct hire personnel would be placed on leave globally, with a few exceptions — a move that would have reduced its workforce from over 10,000 employees to less than 300. Following a lawsuit from federal employee labor unions, a federal judge partially blocked Musk and Trump’s attempted shutdown of USAID — which legal experts argue is illegal without approval from Congress. The judge’s order temporarily blocked the Trump administration from placing USAID workers on leave until February 14, but it allowed a funding freeze to go into effect. Experts have warned that a shutdown of USAID would make China more powerful on the world stage.
The federal workforce
As part of Musk and Trump’s efforts to trim government spending and reduce the federal workforce, the Trump administration emailed a buyout offer to around 2 million government employees. The deferred resignation, sent by the Office of Personnel Management at the end of January, offered to pay employees their full salary and benefits through September, without the need to work during that time, in exchange for their resignation. The offer was met with mass confusion, shock, and outrage from federal employees, many of whom questioned whether the government could actually promise to pay them through September with a looming government shutdown in March when current funding runs out. The offer appeared to come straight out of Musk’s playbook, right down to the title of the email sent to federal workers: “Fork in the Road.” After federal labor unions filed a lawsuit arguing that the offer is illegal, a federal judge twice extended the deadline for employees to accept the buyout, but ultimately ruled that it can proceed. The offer finally closed on February 12, with 75,000 workers accepting the buyout, according to the Office of Personnel Management.
Federal Aviation Administration
Following the deadly American Airlines plane crash in Washington DC in January, Musk announced he would be going after the Federal Aviation Administration. Days after the crash, Musk wrote on X that the FAA’s “primary aircraft safety notification system failed for several hours,” adding that, as a result, Trump gave the DOGE team his approval to “make rapid safety upgrades to the air traffic control system.” Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy confirmed Musk’s role, saying the DOGE team was “going to plug in to help upgrade our aviation system.” Republican Senator Ted Cruz of Texas — who chairs the committee that oversees the FAA — said he’s confident in Musk’s ability to upgrade the FAA, adding that the American people should take “real comfort in his ability to navigate complicated technologies.” Not everyone has so much faith in Musk. Democratic Senator Maria Cantwell of Washington argued in a letter to Duffy that, as the CEO of SpaceX, Musk has a clear conflict of interest that should prohibit his involvement with the FAA. Last year, the FAA proposed fining SpaceX more than $600,000 for two occasions where the rocket company is said to have violated its launch licenses.
Treasury Department
Trump said he granted Musk and his DOGE team access to the Treasury department’s digital payments system, which controls trillions of dollars in payments to Americans — everything from Social Security benefits to tax refunds.
The Treasury Department said Musk’s team was only granted “read-only” access to the system, but the move still sparked criticism, particularly from Democratic lawmakers and federal workers’ unions. The unions sued the Treasury Department, arguing that the agency had illegally granted Musk access to sensitive personal and financial information.
Trump defended Musk’s access to the platform, telling reporters it was only so that DOGE could find additional areas to cut government waste. “Elon can’t do and won’t do anything without our approval, and we will give him the approval where appropriate,” Trump said.
Federal Emergency Management Agency
Trump has threatened to overhaul, or entirely scrap, the Federal Emergency Management Agency, which provides aid to Americans following natural disasters like Hurricane Milton and the LA wildfires.
The president has called the agency, which employs more than 20,000 staff around the US, a “very big disappointment” that is “very bureaucratic,” “very slow,” and costs “a tremendous amount of money.”
On February 10, Musk wrote on X that “FEMA betrayed the American people by diverting funds meant for natural disasters to pay for luxury hotels for illegal migrants.” But New York City officials said that FEMA had correctly allocated the funds, which were never part of a disaster relief grant and were not used on luxury hotels, as Musk had said, The New York Times reported. Hours after Musk’s post, FEMA’s acting director, Cameron Hamilton, posted on X that the payments had been suspended and that the responsible personnel will be held accountable. On February 11, a spokesperson for the Department of Homeland Security announced that four FEMA officials had been fired in connection to the payments, including the agency’s Chief Financial Officer, two program analysts, and a grant specialist.
National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration
On February 6, a group of Democratic lawmakers accused “unelected and unvetted associates of Elon Musk and the so-called Department of Government Efficiency” of targeting the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration. The NOAA is in charge of forecasting the weather, analyzing climate data, and tracking extreme weather events. Senator Chris Van Hollen and Congressman Jamie Raskin, along with other Maryland Democrats, penned a letter alleging that DOGE bureaucrats had been visiting NOAA headquarters, housed within the Department of Commerce, with the intent to break up the agency and merge it with the Department of the Interior.
In their letter, the lawmakers urged the leaders of the US Department of Commerce, Howard Lutnick and Jeremy Pelter, to maintain the independence and integrity of the NOAA, as Lutnick had promised to do in his confirmation hearing. The lawmakers argue that DOGE is illegally attacking NOAA without congressional approval, in an attempt to dismantle and privatize the agency which they say would rob American farmers, businesses, and citizens of crucial, life-saving services.
Consumer Financial Protection Bureau
Musk has repeatedly called for the elimination of the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, which was established in 2011 after the Great Recession to oversee financial products and services offered to Americans. It seeks to protect Americans from financial scams and abusive practices, like excessive overdraft fees. “CFPB RIP,” Musk wrote on X last week next to a tombstone emoji. Trump’s Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent ordered the CFPB to halt most of its work and told the consumer watchdog agency to stop issuing “public communications of any type.” The CFPB has told staffers to “not perform any work tasks” this week while it shuts down its DC headquarters amid an uncertain future. The agency followed up by sending termination notices to dozens of employees, some of whom had already accepted the buyout offer, sources familiar with the situation told CNBC. The agency’s first director, Richard Cordray, has warned that shuttering the CFPB would turn the consumer finance world into the “wild, wild west,” adding that Musk’s attempted shutdown is unethical and, with his plans to offer financial services through X, could be considered a conflict of interest.
