This is a simple roadmap for the Department of Government Efficiency’s work in the Appropriations process. It is meant to provide very practical guidance on eliminating government programs based on how Congress actually appropriates money and the massive roadblocks which are in place to prevent change, especially change which threatens the jobs of Congressional staff and Administration bureaucrats.
- DOGE has one appropriations cycle to accomplish its work. DOGE does not have until July 4, 2026. By then it will have become a footnote.
- Do not get caught up in detailed analysis of programs. First, the leaders of DOGE are business people who recognize bad ideas when they are before them. Second, analyzing programs is what the defenders are masters of. They will string DOGE out defending its decisions until time simply gives them victory. Ask Simpson and Bowles. Decide what to eliminate, get the President’s buy in and get on with it.
Each recommendation should be no more than a one page tear sheet. Keep it very simple; apply first principles; don’t get caught up in esoteric cost/benefit analysis or program performance. Taxpayers understand a bad idea just as well as DOGE leaders. - Do not be tricked by claims that since a program’s authorization remains its appropriation cannot be cut to zero. Once the money is gone, DOGE and OMB can work to clean up authorizing legislation. At one time, appropriation bills did not contain authorizing language. However, that is now commonplace. Therefore, it should not be inappropriate to simply add language to an appropriation bill stating that prior legislation is repealed. In any case, once the money is gone, the champions will be few.
- Go Big or Go Home: Congress, government departments and agencies, and their non-profit and industry supporters will eat DOGE alive if it fails to go big. There are 12 appropriation bills each containing hundreds of programs and line items. DOGE must propose eliminating a sufficient number of programs in each bill to overwhelm the opposition. If two programs in a bill are targeted, the primary supporters in a subcommittee will rally support from other Members on the subcommittee to maintain the program. If 20 are proposed, they are overwhelmed.
- Only propose eliminating programs. Reducing spending levels leaves the program and, most importantly, the bureaucracy in place to fight another day. In the unlikely event that a spending reduction survives subcommittee, full committee, House and Senate floor action and the conference between the two bodies, it can be restored in the following year when DOGE no longer exists, when your attention waivers, or, at the latest, when the next president takes office.
Accordingly, for every program to be eliminated, a rescission of all prior appropriations should be included in the relevant appropriation bill.
Similarly, do not get tricked into trying to manage how a program is managed. The bureaucracy knows that political appointees have a lifespan of about 18 months. The bureaucracy is forever. The activist bureaucrat will wait you out pretending to adhere to the Administration’s policies then revert to activism. The careerist simply doesn’t care so long as their job is not at stake. - When eliminating programs, ignore sunk costs as you would when exiting a bad business. Program defenders will argue that they cannot be zeroed out because old commitments or projects must be “managed”. All they mean is that the program will continue until DOGE and the President are gone and then revived. DOGE must eliminate the program and its entire staff to make certain it is gone. If there are loans to be repaid, the Treasury can collect the repayments.
- All program eliminations must be included in the budget which the President submits to Congress. This is paramount. If DOGE targets a program for elimination, there must be no funding for it in the budget. Members of Congress who want to protect the program must be forced to add it back in the appropriation process. In so doing, they can be made to publicly explain why they wish to cut some other program to add something the President did not request.
- A corollary to the previous point is that the President must insist that all appropriations are listed as individual line items in the respective bills. This is particularly important for funds allocated to salaries.
In recent years, the subcommittees have buried program and personnel costs in catch-all language such as:
“For necessary expenses of the Department of State and the Foreign Service not otherwise provided for, including for training, human resources management, and salaries, including employment without regard to civil service and classification laws of persons on a temporary basis…for the regional bureaus of the Department of State and overseas activities as authorized by law; for the functional bureaus of the Department of State, including representation to certain international organizations in which the United States participates pursuant to treaties ratified pursuant to the advice and consent of the Senate or specific Acts of Congress, general administration, and arms control, nonproliferation, and disarmament activities as authorized; and for security activities.”
A prime target of DOGE is a reduction in the size of the bureaucracy. To accomplish this, you have to have a clearly defined place to cut. That is true of a myriad of other programs which may be hidden in such language. - Where appropriate, proposals for program elimination should be accompanied by Presidential Executive Orders making immediate adjustments to the administration of that program notably freezing all hiring and stopping expenditure not required by law.
- Executive orders are also useful in putting the brakes on programs which require several steps to eliminate. For instance, to protect American investors from unwarranted risk while the United States is withdrawing from membership in the World Bank, a useful Executive Order would be:
Executive Order XXXX of January 20, 2024
By the authority vested in me as President by the Constitution and laws of the United States of America, it is hereby ordered as follows:
Sec. 1. The Secretary of the Treasury as head of the National Advisory Council on International Monetary and Financial Problems shall immediately work with the Chairman of the Securities and Exchange Commission to suspend all classifications as exempted securities of any securities issued by International Bank for Reconstruction and Development (including any guaranty by the bank, whether or not limited in scope), and any securities guaranteed by the bank as to both principal and interest. - The President must demand of the House and Senate leadership that all appropriation bills will be passed in “regular order”. That means that the individual bills must be brought to the floors of the House and Senate for open debate.
This allows for Members supportive of DOGE eliminations to offer amendments to strike any programs or spending which may have been inserted in the Committee process. This provides yet another opportunity to require spending supporters to explain why they are supporting programs the President has marked for elimination and what other spending they would eliminate to make room for their favorite.
If Congress is allowed to wrap spending bills into omnibus bills passed hurriedly at points of urgency, any proposed eliminations will miraculously be restored. No one will ever admit responsibility or have to face consequences at the ballot box. - DOGE must recognize that every program has both a parent and a protector. If the parent Member is still in Congress, they will fight DOGE at every turn. If they are retired, there will be at least one Member who remains as the protector of the program. Within each Appropriations subcommittee, members will have particular programs which they support vehemently. Other Members will usually defer to this protector as he will defer to them on their protected programs.
DOGE must identify these parents and protectors early, and move swiftly to neutralize them. All Members have one great fear: reelection. They must be made to feel that this is threatened by opposing the President on elimination of programs. Once again, having sufficient program eliminations in each bill leaves proponents isolated.
DOGE must have at least one ally on each subcommittee who has one goal: reducing the scope of government. This will be a very hard person to find among appropriators but is an essential element for success. These allies must be willing to challenge any deviations from the President’s budget at the Subcommittee and Committee markups, establishing a written record of who the program champions are.
This challenge must be magnified during debates on the House and Senate floors. When bills go to a House-Senate conference, the committee chairmen will inevitably exclude DOGE allies from participating. Programs which were eliminated or cut in the individual bills will miraculously reappear. This must be anticipated and called out by the President. - DOGE efforts in Washington should be backed up by a well-financed PAC which runs ads in the districts and states of Appropriation Committee members asking constituents to write and call their Member or Senator demanding that programs be eliminated.
“There is a homeless crisis in Centerville. Our swamplands remain threatened by pollution. Our city water supply often fails to provide safe water and we are threatened with rising sea levels.
Congress is set to vote on funding for housing, pollution and rising sea levels.
But the money is going as foreign aid to The World Bank. Not to Centerville, USA.
Your Congressman chairs the subcommittee which can stop this from happening.
Call him at 202-555-5555 and let him know that you oppose any funding for The World Bank. Tell him that you are a constituent and you expect him to look after Centerville, USA first.”
DOGE needs constituents in every Congressional district on its side. - Reduction in the bureaucracy must be a primary goal of DOGE. Targeting large reductions in government jobs has two important aspects. First, and obviously, it removes the unbelievable bloat of unaccountable bureaucrats. But, secondly, proposing large cuts in federal jobs creates panic which diverts organized opposition to program elimination to simply protecting jobs.
An initial target of a 20% reduction in force across the civil service and a 40% reduction in contract employees is recommended.
Washington is a tangled web of alliances. Congress creates programs which develop bureaucracies. Congress then expands its own bureaucracy to monitor these programs.
At the same time, think tanks and non-profits which analyze and support these programs proliferate. These serve a dual purpose of keeping the spending flowing and providing employment havens for political appointees when their party is out of office, for Congressional staff, and for Members who retire, voluntarily or otherwise.
Threatening employment levels is thus the number one concern of all. This will be a powerful force against DOGE but can be turned to advantage simply due to the chaos it will create. - Ignore collective bargaining agreements in cutting jobs and requiring federal workers to return to their offices. Statutes override collective bargaining agreements. To make certain this is understood, try the following language:
“Not withstanding any other provision of law or this resolution and superseding any applicable collective bargaining agreements, none of the funds allocated to the Department of Waste and Fraud may be used to support remote work by its employees or contractors.” - Apart from program elimination, DOGE can play a valuable role in reforming appropriations which allow for open-ended spending. The House Appropriations Committee markup for the Departments of Labor, Health and Human Services, and Education, and related agencies contained the following language in its section on Medicaid funding:
“In addition, for carrying out such titles after May 31, 2025, for the last quarter of fiscal year 2025 for unanticipated costs incurred for the current fiscal year, such sums as may be necessary, to remain available until expended. In addition, for carrying out such titles for the first quarter of fiscal year 2026, $261,063,820,000, to remain available until expended.” (emphasis added)
“Such sums” appropriations allow for unlimited spending, allowing Congress to abrogate its Constitutional responsibility and allowing individual Members to disavow responsibility for spiraling deficits. Moreover, they are an obvious invitation for fraud as any monies which are drained by fraud are simply replaced. No one really cares.
DOGE should attack such appropriations language and the President should make clear that such open-ended appropriations face a certain veto. - Two Technical Points:
First, when preparing language for appropriation bills, make use of the phrase “Notwithstanding any other provision of law or this resolution”. This clears out any unforeseen obstacles. It has the added benefit of driving agency lawyers nuts.
Second, be mindful of “report language”. This is language in the report accompanying a bill which the committees use to try to force policies which they either could not get passed through the appropriation process or which might have been subject to a point of order.
Report language IS NOT LAW but the committees act as though it is and attempt to hold the Administration to it. When making a change that is not a complete program elimination, report language from some long ago legislation could be used by program supporters in an attempt to prevent change.