DOGE is a fraud

Today was a congressional hearing that most of you have probably never heard of, but if you really believe in finding fraud, waste, over spending, and abuse, you need to look into it. Today the Comptroller General of the United States met with members from Congress to discuss the Government Accountability Office’s High Risk report. This report shows all of the recommendations across the federal government the GAO has made that identifies programs at high risk for waste, fraud, abuse, and mismanagement. There are 38 high risk categories spread across the government. Some are shared across agencies, and some are agency specific. Please, if you’re interested in seeing people truly care about making our government efficient, check out the GAO’s website.

Now that I’ve done a brief overview of what the hearing was about today, let’s talk about what was discussed today. First, Gene Dodaro is fucking awesome, and the GAO is too. They handled some pointed and contentious questions from both sides with a level or professionalism that’s all too rare today in government. This is usually a relatively calm conversation for all, but in today’s chaos, this hearing got a little intense at times. Political grandstanding on both sides, but the idiots on the right were VERY loud today. Both sides agree that GAO plays an important role, but how GAO is handling the new administration, the left and right can’t agree. The big topic today…DOGE. GAO has taken their mission and saved billions of dollars every year, many from their High Risk list, for decades and decades. DOGE has obviously not. GAO goes into the various programs in each agency with precision and expertise from their teams and the agencies being audited to use surgical precision to make strategic and implementable recommendations. DOGE goes in like a wrecking ball, destroying everything indiscriminately. GAO builds strong relationships with every agency and is respected by the agencies, and thanked for their work in every audit, damn near every time. DOGE has destroyed every agency they’ve touched, causing chaos and anxiety.

Unfortunately for Mr. Dodaro, he was subjected to the dysfunction we’ve all seen on the news. He was there to discuss the GAOs high risk list, and was subjected to nonsensical arguments from the right and how DOGE is the one that’s going to fix the waste, fraud, and abuse. Claiming they’ll find 2 trillion dollars A YEAR in this category. GAO who is well established, trained, and know these programs far better than Elon and his minions will ever be able to know. The reason? GAO wants to fix. They want to help. They want to strengthen the agencies through finding the weaknesses and building them up. When asked the direct question of “Will DOGE find their 2 trillion in waste” the comptroller general said there’s no way. Mr Dodaro, who has over 50 years of audit experience, surrounded by brilliant directors that know their areas of expertise better than anyone, could never find that kind of waste. BECAUSE IT DOESN’T EXIST. Cutting programs that you don’t like, or go against your mission, is not fraud.

One of the biggest areas brought up was having to do with veterans healthcare. When asked about his feelings and findings across numerous reports what the biggest issue is, it’s human capital and the lack of staffing and retention. To sum it up, the VA needs to find ways to retain their talent, increase staffing in mental healthcare, and increase nurses, doctors, etc. What did DOGE do? Cut thousands of jobs, to include people answering phones on the veterans crisis hotline. Mr Dodaro had the simple response that this is going to make things worse. His Director running that program, more of the same. DOGE is not helping efficiency there. They’re making everything worse.

The last thing I’m going to write about tonight is in line with the issues happening at the VA. Human capital is a big fucking problem across the federal government. Retention and recruitment of talented people is a real problem. Since the federal employees salaries account for less than 10% of the federal budget, it seems that DOGE has no fucking idea what they’re doing since all they want to do is fire people. Take a wild guess at what kind of effect GAO says is going to happen from this? Is it going to find that waste DOGE is claiming? Fuck no.

Watch the hearing. Read the high risk report. Check out the GAO’s website! Read reports that interest you and see the amazing work that they do. The work GAO does and that the various IGs do is what’s going to find the waste. DOGE is not doing anything but destroying our workforce and our country.