Latest / Elon Musk Podcast / DOGE Cost The Federal Government More Than It Actually Saved
Transcript
- 0:01Hey everybody. Welcome back to the Elon Musk
- 0:04Podcast. This is a show where we discuss
- 0:07the critical crossroads, the Shape, SpaceX, Tesla X, The
- 0:11Boring Company, and Neurolink. I'm your host, Will.
- 0:15Walden All right, Well, good morning, everyone.
- 0:17Welcome to the Doge subcommittee.
- 0:20Notwithstanding the abject failure of the Doge enterprise
- 0:24inside the federal government and the epic breakup of Elon
- 0:27Musk and Donald Trump, here we are again, once again in this
- 0:31committee. I'm grateful that the chairwoman
- 0:34showed again one of my favorite videos, which she showed on the
- 0:36first day of the subcommittee. I'm grateful because it
- 0:39highlights the work that we've been doing for decades to root
- 0:42out waste, fraud, and abuse, including work that I was
- 0:44intimately involved in as a budget examiner in the Office of
- 0:49Management and Budget in which we actually eliminated waste,
- 0:52fraud, and abuse. But unfortunately, as my friends
- 0:56across the aisle in the GOP and their village foundation
- 1:00witnesses are still trying to make Doge happen yet again, the
- 1:05American people are over it. In fact, you don't have to take
- 1:08my word for it. A poll from just two weeks ago
- 1:12found that 67% of voters believe Doge has done a bad job.
- 1:17That was just two weeks ago. And in fact, when I told one of
- 1:21my friends that we were having another Doge subcommittee
- 1:23hearing, they asked, really, is that still happening?
- 1:26Because literally the American people are over it.
- 1:29That it's not funny because Dodge has been used to wage a
- 1:33chaotic, destructive and ideological war against the
- 1:37American people and the vital programs that they depend on.
- 1:41But I'm going to turn to that in just a moment here.
- 1:44Given everything that's happening in the world right now
- 1:47and with this administration, I don't think we can sit here and
- 1:50pretend like everything is normal.
- 1:52Because just four days ago, the president launched an
- 1:56unauthorized military attack in Iran without the consent of
- 2:00Congress, putting our troops and our bases in harm's way, as we
- 2:04saw just last night with the retaliatory bombing of one of
- 2:07our largest bases. And Madam Chair, I have actually
- 2:10been extremely grateful and wholeheartedly agree with your
- 2:13outspoken advocacy against this war.
- 2:17But like so many in this administration, so many days and
- 2:21weeks, this follows weeks of chaos here at home as the
- 2:25president has deployed U.S. Marines and National Guard on
- 2:28our own soil against our own people.
- 2:30His DHS secretary and federal officials shoved AUS senator to
- 2:35the ground. DOJ indicted a sitting
- 2:38congresswoman in this House for doing her job and tried to
- 2:43arrest a New York City official in a federal courthouse.
- 2:46This is not only not normal, it is dangerous.
- 2:49It is anti American and it is anti Democratic.
- 2:53And so we're not going to sit here today and pretend like what
- 2:56this administration is doing is normal, and we're not going to
- 3:00sit here and pretend like Doge is just some normal government
- 3:04program. It is a scam in service of a
- 3:08political agenda. Well, we came to the table at
- 3:11the beginning of this whole process in good faith, with real
- 3:15ideas, bipartisan ideas that folks have been working on for
- 3:18years, and a desire to actually fix and modernize the federal
- 3:22government. What we've seen from DOGE is the
- 3:24exact opposite. It is so failed in its stated
- 3:28mission of saving money that even the president asked if it
- 3:32was bullshit is Elon Musk was exiting the building.
- 3:35And if they want to talk about fiscal responsibility while
- 3:39we're sitting here, they're still trying to pass a
- 3:42reconciliation bill across the aisle that would saddle
- 3:47taxpayers with $2.5 trillion in deficit spending.
- 3:52And in the last few weeks, reports have revealed that DOGE
- 3:55may actually have cost the federal government more than it
- 3:58actually saved because of the mass firings, dismantled
- 4:02agencies, stolen data, lawsuits agencies, and chaos agencies
- 4:07that are not able to do their basic operational duties.
- 4:10This is not efficiency. This is a scam.
- 4:14And that's not even to mention the completely reckless and
- 4:17needless suffering that DOGE has caused.
- 4:20We're talking about millions of children and people across the
- 4:23planet who no longer will have access to food and medicine
- 4:27because of the very $9 billion rescission package that was just
- 4:31discussed. Thousands of veterans and public
- 4:34service member servants here at home whose lives have been
- 4:37shattered. And millions of Americans who've
- 4:39been impacted by the gutting of vital programs, including
- 4:42staffing Social Security. And now they're here today to
- 4:46try to make the case for making it permanent.
- 4:49Are you serious? Really.
- 4:51Are you serious? I can't even believe my ears.
- 4:54So why are they actually trying to make Doge permanent?
- 4:59Well, I think I think you have to look no further than the
- 5:01witnesses that they've called over the last several hearings,
- 5:04including today. We've got the Heritage
- 5:06Foundation and other authors and architects of Project 2025.
- 5:11And so we have to be real about what this is actually about.
- 5:14It's not about efficiency. It's about a political agenda,
- 5:17an ideological agenda about remaking the US government,
- 5:21about remaking our economy and our society in line with a hyper
- 5:26conservative worldview that is so unpopular that even Donald
- 5:30Trump tried to distance himself from Project 2025 during the
- 5:34campaign. And now he's hired over 70
- 5:36officials to try to enact it. And now they're trying to use
- 5:40this committee to to make the case.
- 5:43Now they like to try to claim that they're taking on cancel
- 5:46culture and awoke agenda. But let's be clear, Doge and the
- 5:50folks who want to make it permanent are the actual cancel
- 5:53culture because they want to cancel anything that they don't
- 5:56like or they don't agree with, including your democratic rights
- 6:00and your freedoms, economic opportunity and education, LGBTQ
- 6:04plus rights. Rolling back the clock on civil
- 6:07rights, canceling the history of Black, Chicano and Indigenous
- 6:12communities, and stripping protections from our families
- 6:16and the healthcare, housing and food people depend on so that
- 6:20they can give more tax breaks to their friends.
- 6:23But this is all part of a wider agenda that is now seeking to
- 6:27apply political purity test to government programs and
- 6:31services, including both federal employment and yes, veteran
- 6:35services. Let me repeat that again.
- 6:38Even veterans benefits, they want to apply political purity
- 6:43test to your VA benefits. Folks, this is not about
- 6:48efficiency. This is about eroding and
- 6:51privatizing our institutions, gutting programs that keep our
- 6:55people and our country safe. It's about rewriting history and
- 6:59remaking society to take us back decades, if not centuries.
- 7:04In short, it's about making this country less free, less
- 7:07democratic, less prosperous, and frankly, consolidating power
- 7:12under Trump and his allies who are becoming increasingly
- 7:16dangerous, ideological and, yes, autocratic.
- 7:21So we have to be clear eyed about what is actually going on
- 7:25because this administration and its allies, if they are willing
- 7:29to arrest and indict elected officials who are just doing
- 7:33their jobs, including AUS senator and AUS congresswoman,
- 7:38what will they do if we let them get away with it?
- 7:41We cannot and we will not remain silent.
- 7:44We have to continue to speak up, to speak out and continue to
- 7:48stand together. I yield back without objection.
- 7:52Hey, thank you so much for listening today.
- 7:54I really do appreciate your support.
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