We’re not even 100 days into the presidency of Donald Trump, but already, we’re looking at a very different America.
Well, at least in terms of the federal workforce.
Following the President’s directive for Elon Musk to intensify efforts to reduce government spending by $2 trillion, the head of DOGE proceeded with significant layoffs of probationary employees, advanced the deferred resignation proposal, and issued a broad email requiring government employees to justify their positions.
There are concerns regarding the legality of Musk’s actions, but for the moment, the ‘special government employee’ is aggressively cutting federal expenditures.
Although Trump expresses satisfaction with DOGE’s performance, there have been several missteps and questionable figures regarding the actual savings achieved by the organization.
Elon Musk is trying to cut $2 trillion from government spending (Andrew Harnik / Staff / Getty)
An article by the New York Times aims to reveal the current situation within the DOGE, reporting that more than $4 billion in savings has been erased.
The DOGE’s so-called ‘wall of receipts’ claims to have saved U.S. taxpayers $105 billion, translating to about $652.17 for each taxpayer, assuming the figures are accurate.
On March 2, the NYT reported that the DOGE removed over 1,000 contracts it previously claimed to have canceled, which accounts for more than 40% of all cancellations that week. However, it subsequently added another 1,000 canceled contracts that represented a significantly lower total in savings.
This situation became embarrassing for the DOGE after it deleted its five largest claimed savings following criticism from various media outlets about inaccuracies.
Among the errors were three instances of a reported $655 million cut at the U.S. Agency for International Development, which was found to be incorrect and has now been revised down to just $18 million.
Additionally, a reported $232 million cut at the Social Security Administration was actually only a $560,000 reduction. The official DOGE website states: “We are working to upload all of our receipts in a digestible and transparent manner consistent with applicable rules and regulations.”
“To get started, listed below are a subset of contract, grant, and lease cancellations, representing approximately 30% of total savings.”
One issue is that the ‘wall’ does not encompass all cuts made, making it difficult to substantiate the claimed $105 billion in savings.
Even with the deletions, DOGE didn't fix its erroneous link to a $99 million contract that isn't canceled that's supposed to be a $9.9 million cancellation. pic.twitter.com/xI1IbjuNFo
— stephen fowler (@stphnfwlr) March 3, 2025
As pointed out by the NYT, there are multiple incidents where millions are incorrectly reported as billions, as well as taking credit for contracts that were canceled during the Biden administration or even decades earlier.
Jessica Riedl, a senior fellow at the Manhattan Institute, said: “Overall, there’s a certain randomness to it. It seems like DOGE had certain agencies pull together some random lists of contracts that may or may not currently exist anyway, and then, without checking the data very well, uploaded it onto a website and summed up the amounts. It doesn’t seem to be centrally coordinated.”
The DOGE and The White House didn’t respond to the NYT’s request for comment, but now, wording has been changed to seemingly shift blame as it adds that figures “originate directly from agency contracting officials.”
This time around, scrapped savings included $1.9 billion for axing an Internal Revenue Service contract for tech help. This was the DOGE’s single biggest claim to savings, but in reality, the contract was canceled under Biden in November 2024.
It looks like someone needs a better calculator.Featured Image Credit: Anna Moneymaker / Staff / Getty