Just like the so-called Department of Government Efficiency it was named after, the House Delivering Outstanding Government Efficiency Caucus has delivered little more than chaos and waste.
Started by Republicans Sen. Joni Ernst of Iowa and Rep. Aaron Bean of Florida, the DOGE caucus pledged to help multibillionaire Elon Musk scour the federal government to find trillions of dollars in waste, fraud, and abuse.
Reps. Jared Moskowitz of Florida and Greg Landsman of Ohio were the first Democrats to join the committee, arguing that if Republicans are truly interested in government efficiency and oversight, Democrats should be at the table. While the move drew some criticism, it effectively called Republicans’ bluff.
“The DOGE caucus is dead. It’s defunct. We haven’t met in months. We only had two total meetings in five months. And we weren’t involved at all in anything [happening at DOGE], which Elon was in charge of. Zero. Zilch. Nada. [Musk] did it all on his own,” Moskowitz told Politico.
He added that “DOGE was a complete failure. Complete failure. Nothing has been made more efficient. Ask the people in Newark [Liberty International Airport, which has suffered delays and cancellations] how efficiency is going.”
And that failure starts at the top. Musk’s clashes with the Trump administration and DOGE’s failure to deliver any real savings—or even spot one example of waste or fraud—have led him to retreat from the government spotlight. Meanwhile, sales of his Tesla vehicles have plummeted, and so has the public’s opinion of him.
The other DOGE byproduct, the House Delivering on Government Efficiency subcommittee, chaired by GOP Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene of Georgia, has fared no better. Its ranking Democrat, Rep. Melanie Stansbury of New Mexico, and fellow lawmakers have repeatedly highlighted the farcical nature of the proceedings. During a recent hearing, Greene wasted time on her ignorant obsession with transgender athletes in sports.
If these DOGE offshoots have succeeded at anything, it’s toeing the Trump administration line: Musk is somehow both in charge of everything DOGE does and completely blameless for its failures.