From the Manhattan Project to IT upgrades: DOGE and the missed federal overhaul

Touted as the ultimate solution to federal government inefficiency, the Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) was proclaimed with bold and grandiose promises. From President Donald Trump's campaign rhetoric to Elon Musk's $2 trillion pledge to cut costs, DOGE was supposed to herald a new era of small government and fiscal discipline.

But those ambitious promises appear to have evaporated as the ink dried on the executive order establishing DOGE (now USDS, short for the U.S. Office of Government Efficiency). What was once described as a Manhattan Project-level effort has been rebranded as a modernization effort focused on improving government software and IT systems. Do you want to save the target? Don't bother looking.

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President Donald Trump signed an executive order establishing the United States DOGE Service (USDS) as one of more than 20 executive actions taken on his first day in office.

Astonishingly, this executive order completely ignores President Trump's campaign promise to “completely audit the finances and performance of the entire federal government and recommend fundamental reforms.'' Instead, the President's DOGE Agenda is presented as a more modest effort centered on “modernizing federal technology and software to maximize government efficiency and productivity.” Streamlining software is certainly helpful, but it is not the revolutionary overhaul of government that was championed in the election campaign.

Additionally, after his November victory, President Trump initially introduced DOGE as a revolutionary-sized external advisory board, but it ultimately turned out to be nothing more than a rebranded version of the U.S. Digital Service (USDS). It turns out. Ironically, the same acronym, but with a shinier collar. Created in 2014 under President Barack Obama, USDS aims to address government IT bottlenecks and improve digital services by bringing in private sector expertise.

regulations

The Executive Order establishes the following major components of the USDS:

Rebranding and structure

This Executive Order rebrands the U.S. Digital Service (USDS) to the U.S. DOGE Service (also known as USDS). This order remains in the Office of the President. It also establishes the U.S. Department of State Services Ad hoc Organization, an ad hoc team led by the USDS Administrator, under the supervision of the White House Chief of Staff. The team has an 18-month mandate to modernize federal technology and streamline operations. Although scheduled to end on July 4, 2026, its closure will not impact the ongoing operations of the broader program.

DOGE team

President Trump has directed all government agencies to establish small DOGE teams within 30 days. These teams include at least four members, including experts such as engineers, human resources professionals, and lawyers. The team will be led by a DOGE team leader and will work closely with DOGE's central office to ensure DOGE is following the President's plan for technology modernization and efficiency improvements.

Agency heads will choose who will join the DOGE team, but will need to consult with the central DOGE office before finalizing the team. DOGE team leaders also help guide agency leaders on how to implement modernization goals.

Software modernization initiative

President Trump directed the USDS administrator to lead a software modernization initiative to improve how government software, IT systems, and networks work across all government agencies. This effort focuses on making disparate government systems work together more smoothly, ensuring the accuracy of government data, and responsibly managing data collection and sharing.

Agency leaders should assist in this process by giving USDS full access to non-classified records, software, and IT systems, as long as it complies with the law. USDS must follow strict data protection standards to keep sensitive information safe.

The order also repeals previous rules and directives that could prevent USDS from accessing the resources it needs to carry out its modernization efforts.

General provisions

Finally, this order does not change the legal authority of government agencies or their leaders or the role of the Office of Management and Budget (OMB) in managing budgets and policies. The order specifies that the authorities will implement it in accordance with existing law only if funds are available. Finally, it clarifies that this order does not create new legal rights. It also denies individuals the ability to sue the government under its provisions.

USDS’ Role in Federal Employment

During the election campaign and in the immediate aftermath, DOGE was touted as a solution to government bloat. Leaders have promised to cut employees and even eliminate entire government agencies. However, their actual role in recruitment is different. The executive order, titled “Reforming the Federal Employment Process and Restoring Merit in Government Service,” assigns DOGE a more modest mission. Instead of wielding the axe, the president directed DOGE to create a federal jobs plan. The plan aims to “recruit only highly skilled Americans into the federal workforce who are dedicated to advancing America's ideals, values, and interests.”

Clearly, DOGE was far from the dramatic layoffs promised during the campaign. His current focus is on advising on recruitment practices. Staff work with agency managers to improve the quality of new hires. This change is inconsistent with the original rhetoric. Still, it positions DOGE as a major player in the restructuring of the federal workforce, but that's more cosmetic than substance.

Pledges to reduce the federal workforce have turned into tweaks to employment policy. Only time will tell whether this adjustment is a realistic strategy or a retreat from bold ambitions.

What is waste reduction?

Musk and Vivek Ramaswamy, DOGE's then-candidate co-chairman, declared the organization the ultimate cost-cutting effort. They aimed to tackle the “wasteful spending” plaguing the federal budget. Musk set the tone for the 2024 campaign with a bold promise to cut federal spending by $2 trillion. This staggering figure exceeded the entire discretionary budget for 2023. It became a rallying cry for fiscal reform and a bold symbol of the administration's vision to rein in government overspending.

But that lofty promise soon collided with the harsh realities of federal budgeting. In a recent interview with political strategist Mark Penn, Musk admitted that the $2 trillion goal was more ambitious than realistic. He suggested that $1 trillion could be achieved instead through cuts, but he still called the achievement “grand.”

But even these scaled back ambitions were not reflected in the executive order establishing USDS. The order does not include any mention of fiscal targets or drastic cost cuts. Instead, the focus has shifted entirely to modernizing federal technology and improving operational efficiency. While these goals may be valuable in terms of cost savings, they lack the dramatic fiscal impact that once defined the promise of this initiative.

Big Tech's Quiet Opportunity

What started as a grand vision for governance and financial reform now feels like a bureaucratic effort for incremental improvement. At the same time, the current focus on modernizing federal technology may inadvertently benefit President Trump's prominent tech industry allies. These include Elon Musk, Jeff Bezos, Mark Zuckerberg, Tim Cook, and Sundar Pichai. Modernizing government infrastructure will likely require large-scale contracts for cloud services, artificial intelligence, and cybersecurity. Amazon, Meta, Apple, and Google dominate all these areas.

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