News/Commentary

First Dem joins DOGE Caucus but his initial recommendation raises some eyebrows

December 3, 2024 | | Print Article

True bipartisanship or an effort to undermine — the first Democratic member of the caucus on government efficiency left some scratching their heads at his lead recommendation.

In aiming to coordinate with President-elect Donald Trump’s proposed Department of Government Efficiency, the House and Senate announced respective DOGE Caucuses for Delivering Outstanding Government Efficiency.

If the competing acronyms weren’t enough to hit home with how out of practice Washington, D.C. denizens were with efficiency, Florida Rep. Jared Moskowitz’s (D) initial proposal to add more direct reports to the president added clarity to the challenge for co-heads Elon Musk and Vivek Ramaswamy.

“Today, I will join the Congressional DOGE Caucus, because I believe that streamlining the government process and reducing ineffective government spending should not be a partisan issue,” said Moskowitz in a statement.

“I’ve been clear that there are ways we can reorganize our government to make it work better for the American people,” he went on. “Specifically, the Department of Homeland Security, while necessary, has gotten too big.”

Echoing sentiments he’d recently shared from a congressional oversight hearing challenging the Federal Emergency Management Agency’s response to Hurricanes Helene and Milton, Moskowitz advanced his idea to separate FEMA, as well as the U.S. Secret Service, from under the purview of DHS.

“The Caucus should look at the bureaucracy that DHS has become and include recommendations to make Secret Service and FEMA independent federal agencies with a direct report to the White House. It’s not practical to have 22 agencies under this one department,” the lawmaker’s statement continued. “I look forward to working in a bipartisan manner with my colleagues to remove FEMA and Secret Service.”

Co-founded by Republican Reps. Aaron Bean of Florida and Pete Sessions of Texas, with Georgia Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene expected to head a House DOGE subcommittee for the House Oversight and Accountability Committee, the DOGE Caucus had a Senate counterpart led by Iowa’s Joni Ernst who wasted little time in submitting ideas to Musk and Ramaswamy on ways to help attain the target of $2 trillion in cuts in federal spending by July 4, 2026.

“My decade-long mission to make Washington squeal has created an exhaustive list of more than $2 trillion worth of waste, fraud, and abuse that I will work with DOGE to cut,” said Ernst in a statement. “We are going to break down the nonsense that has taken over Washington and put in its place a government that actually works for the people.”

Ahead of an expected meeting between Musk, Ramaswamy, and House Republicans slated for Thursday, many were understandably skeptical about whether or not Moskowitz understood what the ultimate aim of DOGE was considering his proposal smacked of expanding government as many considered President-elect Donald Trump to have received a mandate from voters to take a chainsaw to federal bureaucracy.

Kevin Haggerty
Latest posts by Kevin Haggerty (see all)

Comment

We have no tolerance for comments containing violence, racism, profanity, vulgarity, doxing, or discourteous behavior. If a comment is spam, instead of replying to it please click the ∨ icon below and to the right of that comment. Thank you for partnering with us to maintain fruitful conversation.

Latest Articles