How Elon Musk's mission to cut government spending fell flat As the world's richest man exits his official role, he leaves a fractured bureaucracy, legal battles and his vision unfulfilled Kaitlin Tosh, digital investigations journalist & Kate Schneider, data journalist

Sky News

2 days ago

In February, President Donald Trump appointed Elon Musk as the head of the Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE), a brand new agency tasked with overhauling the US government.
In 2024, the US government spent $7.57tn across hundreds of agencies. DOGE was asked to cut this spending.
Originally, Mr Musk wanted to cut $2tn.
By January, he dialled back his ambitions to $1tn.
More recently, he said DOGE would save just $150bn by the end of the 2026 financial year.
And yet overall government spending hasn't decreased. During Trump's presidency so far, the administration has spent $190bn more than the same period last year.
As Mr Musk exits government, Sky News' Data and Forensics team takes a closer look at what DOGE promised, what's been delivered, and who's been hit hardest by its changes.
On 1 April, Washington DC resident Alex Saint woke up to an unexpected email in her inbox.
"Your duties have been identified as either unnecessary or virtually identical to duties being performed elsewhere in the agency," it read. "You will be separated from the Federal service effective June 2, 2025."
It wasn't an April Fools' joke. Alex and most of her team of communications specialists at the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) had been cut by DOGE.
Her team answered more than 40,000 phone calls last year – 70% of which came from the public to ask questions about medications, she said.
Now, "there's no way to get those answers to the public", Alex said. "I am very concerned that Americans are going to get hurt or potentially killed by all of the delays that DOGE has caused."
Listen to Alex's story:
In reply to Sky News' request for comment, the FDA said it remains "committed to applying gold standard science to ensure the safety and efficacy of drugs and vaccines for the American people".
"The agency fully adheres to all applicable laws and regulations, and all drug safety recalls, testing, and investigations have continued," the statement added.
The origins of DOGE
When Donald Trump established DOGE via executive order in late January, to many Americans it seemed just the solution to a problem they'd been pointing to for years.
Two-thirds of Americans think there is considerable waste, fraud, and abuse in government spending, according to the Cato Institute. And they have good reason to – the US Government Accountability Office estimates about $2.8tn has been lost since 2003 to improper payments, including duplicates and fraud.
So far, DOGE has slashed billions of dollars' worth of programmes, contracts and grants and cut tens of thousands of jobs. Mr Musk has proudly boasted that he has taken a chainsaw to the federal government.
But despite his efforts, overall spending is up. And a Republican bill championed by Mr Trump, which commits trillions for tax breaks, could see further increases to the government's debt.
"I was disappointed to see the massive spending bill, frankly," he told CBS Sunday Morning early this week, adding it "undermines the work that the DOGE team is doing".
The tone was much cheerier at a farewell press conference in the Oval Office on Friday.
"I think the DOGE team is doing an incredible job," Mr Musk said after accepting a ceremonial key from the president. "They're going to continue to be doing an incredible job."
Pic: AP
The spending cuts
The first agency to feel the full force of Mr Musk's metaphorical chainsaw was the US Agency for International Development (USAID).
Delivering aid and development assistance around the world, the department was an obvious target for Mr Trump. In February, he described it as an "incompetent and really corrupt" agency run by "radical lunatics".
Although USAID was worth less than 1% of federal spending, DOGE cut thousands of its contracts in the first few weeks, claiming savings of $12bn.
As the weeks went on and cuts to foreign assistance and "diversity, equity and inclusion" (DEI) programmes failed to match the billionaire's ambitions, Mr Musk turned towards other targets such as the Department of Defense.
How DOGE's contract cancellations have changed over time
In February and March, USAID became DOGE's primary target for contract cancellations.
It also made some of the largest cuts to the US Treasury and the Department of the Interior.
Smaller cuts were made to the departments of Education, Veterans Affairs, and Homeland Security.
In April, it turned towards the Department of Defense.
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Glaring inaccuracies
As of 15 May, DOGE was claiming a total of $170bn saved. But Sky News analysis shows there are many reasons to question this figure.
1. The total savings aren't verifiable
Mr Musk has repeatedly promised DOGE would operate with " maximum transparency" by posting receipts from cuts on its website. But only $70.9bn of the claimed $170bn in savings are listed. And only $41.2bn of those cuts have any documentation attached for verification.
2. The purported savings don't always match other government sources
Of the listings that have documentation attached, some of the numbers don't add up.
Take the cancelling of a contract between Accenture Federal Services LLC, a government operations consulting firm, and the US Treasury. DOGE claims it will save the government $167.2m.
When we checked the details of the contract on the US government's procurement website, the savings we calculated were smaller.
The total amount the government could possibly spend under the terms of the agreement - the contract cap - was $197.2m. The US Treasury had already spent $78.2m.
The difference between those numbers, or the total savings by cancelling it, is only $119m - $48m less than DOGE claimed.
3. Some cuts occurred before DOGE was created
Take the sale of this US Forest Service building in Ogden, Utah, for example.
Despite a DOGE tweet implying that its $3.4m sale was a result of their efforts, the acquisition of the historic building by the local government was already being arranged in December.
Sky News asked the White House for an explanation for the accounting errors on the DOGE website, as well as whether they believed DOGE wrongly claimed credit for the sale of the US Forest Service building, but they did not respond.
Watch the full story below:
Unprecedented layoffs
DOGE has managed to create sizeable cracks in the foundation of the US government by firing an unprecedented number of people.
Over 60,000 government employees have been laid off. More than 110,000 people have also left through a deferred resignation programme DOGE launched, according to Roger Lee, an independent researcher who has been tracking media reports of government layoffs.
Mass layoffs are part of Mr Musk's business playbook – after buying Twitter in 2022 he fired 80% of the workforce. But it doesn't work to treat the government like a company, says Quinn Slobodian, professor of international history at Boston University.
In business, Mr Musk has been "laser focused on efficiency, streamlining, getting rid of useless parts, getting rid of what he sees as useless employees, and then still producing the product at the end", said Prof Slobodian. "The problem with the federal government is it doesn't just produce one thing."
"To think that you can use the same approaches of streamlining that you use in a firm and scale it up to the level of the entire state is extraordinarily reckless."
The largest exodus has been from the US Treasury, which has lost more than 29,000 employees. Almost all of those workers were at the Internal Revenue Service (IRS), the government tax authority.
Analysis from the Budget Lab at Yale University suggests the job losses will cost more than they will save.
While eliminating 22,000 positions is projected to save the IRS $1.8bn in 2026, the resulting loss in tax revenue is estimated at $10.3bn. In other words, having significantly fewer employees means it is likely less tax will be collected.
After 20 years as a civil servant, Sylvie Williams was recently informed she'd be losing her job at the IRS. At the taxpayer experience office, she worked to make filing taxes – a notoriously complicated process in the US – easier for the average citizen.
"Is there waste? Definitely. Can there be efficiencies? Yes. Can we move faster? Yes," she admits. "But it wasn't done correctly."
"What we're doing now is scaring young people coming out of universities from ever applying to government."
Sylvie Williams, former employee at the Internal Revenue Service
Nearly 2% of the US workforce is employed by the federal government. Combined with their families, this represents a significant portion of the American population affected by DOGE layoffs.
Sky News has seen some of these employees' dismissal letters, known as Reduction in Force (RIF) notices. They make it difficult for staff to dispute being fired.
One gives the email for an Equal Employment Opportunity (EEO) officer to get in touch with to file a complaint. But the EEO officer listed stopped working for the federal government before the RIF notice was sent, according to their LinkedIn profile.
Another outlined how usual redundancy practices were no longer required after an executive order, signed by Mr Trump in March, waived collective bargaining rights for many government employees, citing "national security requirements and considerations".
There are currently multiple ongoing legal battles against these mass layoffs, with several focused on disputing that executive order.
Because of the legal challenges, Alex has been told she may have her job reinstated. Already, a few of her colleagues at the FDA have returned to work, she says.
The other human costs
Many other Americans have felt the impact of these cuts. Across the country, medical research trials and treatment programs have been axed by DOGE.
In California and Florida, for example, research into HIV treatment was cut. In states such as Mississippi and Oklahoma, funding for substance abuse treatment programs was axed – even as Mr Trump declared tackling fentanyl overdoses a priority.
And cuts to vaccination programmes are already being felt. Funding was cut for measles immunisation efforts across Texas in April, which some worry has worsened a measles outbreak across the state. But there's no evidence to support this yet.
School nutrition programmes and food banks around the country have also suddenly found themselves with shortages after Mr Musk's agency cut around $1bn in Department of Agriculture local food grants.
International impact
Cuts made by DOGE have had ripples across the world. Sky News has spent months speaking to international organisations that had their USAID funding cut. We reported on the impact cuts were having on the war in Ukraine in March.
By country, Ukraine received the most funding from USAID - $5.41bn in 2024. Jordan received the second-most, at $1.24bn.
Myriam Abrod-Hugon leads the Middle East division of the global disability charity Humanity and Inclusion. The charity lost funding for 37 projects globally during the DOGE cuts.
"You have a person who has the hope to be able to walk again. And suddenly you say, yeah, sorry, we cannot deliver."
Myriam Abrod-Hugon, Regional Director at Humanity & Inclusion
Multiple charities and aid groups that received funding from USAID were also left confused when a questionnaire landed in their inbox.
It asked them how their project benefitted American interests, including questions like "Can you confirm that this is no DEI project or DEI elements of the project? [sic]" and "Can you confirm that your organization does not work with entities associated with communist, socialist, or totalitarian parties, or any party that espouses anti-American beliefs?".
Sky News asked the State Department what steps were taken to attempt to minimise the impact on vulnerable people across the world through cancelling USAID contracts, but they did not respond.
Musk's government legacy
There are instances where DOGE's actions have been undeniable successes. The way government employees retire, for example, has been streamlined.
Previously, retirements were processed by hand in a limestone mine 230ft underground. Hundreds of staff at the Office for Personnel Management (OPM) spent their days sifting through stacks of paper recording employees' work histories.
As of 2 June 2025, all retirements will be processed on a new online portal developed by DOGE, expediting a process that previously took months.
"This is a transformative step that honours the service of federal employees by offering them a retirement process worthy of the 21st century," said OPM Acting Director Chuck Ezell.
Pic: Paul Rigney / NBC News
And many Americans also believe DOGE's work has been essential and that the losses have been an unfortunate collateral of fixing government.
Chris Gergen, a conservative political strategist and founder of Dark Horse Political, sees DOGE and Mr Musk's efforts as a long-needed response to tackling rampant corruption in America's political system.
"The idea of efficiency and being efficient is something that, in American politics, we have talked a lot about since I've been alive and I'm almost 50."
Chris Gergen, founder of Dark Horse Political
Nevertheless, many critics have been concerned that the cuts have been counterproductive – making government more inefficient, inaccessible, and less democratic.
"It's most like an asset-stripping operation, like a private equity firm buying up a failing business, selling everything they can and then seeking to flip it," says Prof Slobodian.
"The problem is there's no one that the state can be sold to at the end. Once you've stripped out all of the functioning parts of the government, you're left with a non-functioning government."
While the long-term impact of DOGE's changes are yet to be fully determined, Mr Musk admitted earlier this month that the agency had not been "as effective as I'd like", claiming an "entrenched set of interests" had blocked further reform.
Although he is leaving government, he clearly hopes his legacy will endure. "This is not the end of DOGE, this is really the beginning," Mr Musk promised at his farewell press conference in the Oval Office.
For Alex Saint, that statement rings true. There is "definitely a lot of animosity aimed at him", she said. But ultimately she sees him as a "figurehead".
"People don't believe it's going to stop with him."
Credits
Reporting: Kaitlin Tosh & Kate Schneider
Video editing: Kaitlin Tosh
Shorthand development: Kate Schneider
Producers: Michelle Inez Simon & Reece Denton
Editors: Chris Howard, Isla Glaister, & Natasha Muktarsingh
Graphics: Joe Jackson, Luan Leer, James Packer, Stephen Whistance, & Anisa Momen
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