The Department of Government Efficiency has been the centerpiece of the administration's promise to slash federal waste and return taxpayer dollars to the American people. The numbers DOGE has published tell a story of historic savings. Independent investigators examining those numbers tell a different story: the savings are largely phantom, the government is spending more — not less — than before the efficiency drive began, and the cuts that did happen share a common thread.
That thread leads directly to Elon Musk's private business empire.
The Numbers Don't Add Up
DOGE has published a running list of contract terminations and grant cancellations on its public-facing website, claiming billions in taxpayer savings. The New York Times conducted an independent examination of the 40 largest claims on that list. Of those 40, the Times found only 12 that appeared accurate — representing actual reductions in government spending commitments. The remaining 28 were described as inaccurate, unverifiable, or inflated.
The headline figure illustrating the discrepancy: DOGE listed two Defense Department contracts at the top of its savings register, claiming combined savings of $7.9 billion and listing both as terminated. According to reporting by the New York Times, both contracts remain active. The government is still paying for them. The claimed savings were described as "an accounting mirage."
Musk promised $2 trillion in cuts during the 2024 campaign. After the election, that figure was revised sharply downward. The actual result, according to federal spending trackers, is that the government spent more in the first quarter of 2026 than in the equivalent period before the DOGE initiative launched. The efficiency operation has not produced net savings by any publicly verifiable measure.
No Inspector General, No Accountability
A government agency cutting federal spending would ordinarily face scrutiny from an inspector general — the independent watchdog offices embedded in each department, empowered to audit, investigate, and report on waste, fraud, and abuse. DOGE operates within the Executive Office of the President, a structure that keeps it outside the jurisdiction of any dedicated inspector general with authority to proactively examine its operations.
The DOGE Accountability and Transparency Act (H.R. 2742), introduced in the 119th Congress, noted that DOGE "pushed for large-scale reductions in force and office closures" and called for any such reductions to be "based on real and transparent analysis and formal, deliberate program evaluation, not for the purposes of pursuing personal vendettas or yielding personal financial gain." The legislation has not been enacted.
The Supreme Court has also declined to compel DOGE to release records that would allow public accounting of its activities, despite Musk's own claims that DOGE is transparent. The administration, in separate court filings, has simultaneously argued that Musk is "not an employee" of DOGE and "lacks legal authority" to make government decisions — a position that, if true, raises the question of who is accountable for the decisions being made.
DOGE is scheduled to terminate on July 4, 2026.
The Cuts That Actually Happened
Set aside the fictitious savings claims. The cuts DOGE did execute tell a pattern that accountability journalists and government watchdogs have been documenting for months.
FDA investigators reviewing clinical trials for Neuralink — Musk's brain-computer interface company — were among the approximately 5,200 workers terminated from the Department of Health and Human Services in February 2025. Roughly 20 employees from the FDA's Office of Neurological and Physical Medicine Devices were let go. The dismissal letters cited performance reasons. Those employees' supervisors were not consulted before the terminations. The dismissed staff had received top performance rankings weeks before being fired.
Victor Krauthamer, a former FDA official who served as acting director of the office that reviews human-trial requests for brain implants, said the firings were "intimidating to the FDA professionals who are overseeing Neuralink's trial." He added: "We should be worried about the whole trial, and the protection of the people in the trial."
Dr. Robert Steinbrook of Public Citizen's Health Research Group called it a "blatant conflict of interest," noting that Musk holds a direct financial stake in the outcome of Neuralink's regulatory review. Neuralink has already faced scrutiny for trial practices: animal welfare investigations found that monkeys used in early Neuralink testing died during experiments.
The Consumer Financial Protection Bureau — the agency that would regulate mobile payment services and digital financial products — was effectively dismantled in DOGE's first weeks. Musk has publicly discussed building a payments function into X, his social media platform, which would place X's financial services squarely within the CFPB's jurisdiction. That agency no longer has the capacity to exercise that oversight.
The FAA, which regulates SpaceX launch operations, saw significant workforce reductions. The USDA inspector general, who was actively leading an investigation into Neuralink's animal welfare practices, was removed from her office by security personnel after refusing to comply with her termination order.
The White House's stated position on Musk's conflicts of interest is that Musk himself will adjudicate them. "He will rule on his own conflicts of interest," press secretary Karoline Leavitt said earlier this year.
► Who Benefits?
The following analysis tracks who stands to gain from the actions taken — and not taken — by DOGE.
Elon Musk / Neuralink: The FDA staff reviewing Neuralink's brain implant clinical trial were fired. No replacement team has been announced. The regulatory friction on Neuralink's path to commercialization has been materially reduced.
Elon Musk / X (formerly Twitter): The CFPB, which would regulate X's planned mobile payments product, was gutted. A competitor's payment platform recently settled with the CFPB for $175 million. X faces no equivalent enforcement exposure under current conditions.
Elon Musk / SpaceX: The FAA, responsible for approving SpaceX launch licenses, lost significant staff. SpaceX's launch cadence and expansion plans are directly affected by FAA review timelines.
Defense Contractors: Two of the largest contracts listed as terminated on DOGE's public savings register remain active. The contractors are still receiving payment. The savings are listed as real. No clawback has been initiated.
The Executive Office of the President: By housing DOGE within the Executive Office rather than establishing it as a formal agency, the administration ensured that DOGE's operations fall outside standard inspector general oversight — a structural choice that benefits anyone who would prefer those operations not be scrutinized.
What Congress Should Do
The DOGE Accountability and Transparency Act established the right framework: any government efficiency operation must document its savings claims, submit to independent audit, and be prohibited from targeting agencies based on the personal financial interests of those running the operation. That legislation has not advanced.
The GAO High Risk List has flagged federal contracting and financial management as chronic waste generators since 1990. The infrastructure for legitimate government efficiency work exists. Inspectors general, GAO, and congressional oversight committees have the tools to find and address genuine waste — if they are allowed to function.
An efficiency operation that operates in secrecy, without independent oversight, and that consistently produces results aligned with the financial interests of its operator is not government reform. It is the replacement of one form of waste with another.
Congress has the authority to compel DOGE's records, restore the agencies it has damaged, and pass the accountability legislation that has been waiting for a vote. Whether it will exercise that authority before DOGE's July 4 sunset is the accountability question of this term.