The US DOGE Service, the repurposed government agency tasked with carrying out Elon Musk’s Department of Government Efficiency agenda to cut a trillion dollars in federal spending, has reportedly lost access to a key government website responsible for distributing roughly $500 billion in annual awards, the latest blow to the initiative after Musk’s acrimonious split from the Trump administration earlier this month.
Earlier this year, DOGE reportedly assumed effective control of grants.gov, a clearinghouse for federal funding opportunities, requiring new proposals to be sent to a DOGE-controlled mailbox for review before being posted.
In the ensuing months since the April policy change, grant opportunities reportedly piled up inside the mailbox, leaving funds at risk of going unspent before the end of the government fiscal year at the end of September.
On Thursday, federal officials were instructed to stop running grant proposals through DOGE, The Washington Post reports….
…
- Congress has until July 18 to pass a $9.4 billion DOGE cuts package.
- That includes cuts to foreign aid and public broadcasting.
- It’s running into resistance from GOP senators.
The House narrowly approved the cuts, in part identified by Musk and the White House DOGE Office, earlier this month.
The administration’s troubles were evident at a Senate Appropriations Committee hearing on Wednesday. Lawmakers in both parties highlighted the potential negative impacts of clawing back the funding as they heard testimony from Russell Vought, the director of the White House Office of Management and Budget.
“We have Native American radio stations in South Dakota. They get their funding through NPR, 90-some percent of what they use,” Republican Sen. Mike Rounds of South Dakota said at the hearing. “They will not continue to exist if we don’t find a way to take care of their needs.”
Republican Sen. Susan Collins of Maine, the committee chair, also raised concerns about the $1.1 billion in public broadcasting cuts. Another moderate Republican, Sen. Lisa Murkowski of Alaska, has previously said that she’s opposed to the cuts because rural Alaskan communities depend on the funding.
Leave a Reply
You must be logged in to post a comment.