by Sam Adolphsen
For decades, Americans have been vaguely aware of the now $36 trillion millstone of federal debt around our collective necks. Historically, the abstraction of the national debt barely nudged the body politic to concern themselves with government spending.
The electorate largely ignored it. And so did too many of their representatives.
Then historic inflation dragged people kicking and screaming up to the edge of their own personal fiscal cliff. They got a good look into the bottomless pit, and based on the results of the election, they didn’t like what they saw.
President-elect Donald Trump offered a lifeline to pull us back from financial ruin, and voters from all backgrounds clung to it, seeing him as a last best chance to get back from the brink.
Now, the president-elect is making good on his campaign promise to make America affordable again by tapping Elon Musk and Vivek Ramaswamy to radicalize fiscal sanity with an aggressive effort to dismantle the bureaucracy that is driving government spending and out-of-control waste and fraud.
The long-overdue Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) strikes at the heart of America’s near-terminal spending addiction and starts the doomsday clock on every useless federal grant, program or bureaucrat.
But let’s be honest: Washington isn’t the only culprit when it comes to using and abusing taxpayers. State and local governments routinely flush away taxpayer money (often borrowed) on bloated bureaucracies and rubber-stamping federal funds without a second thought.
It is time for states to join the radical efficiency revolution by creating their own DOGEs.
To be sure, the D.C. spending beast bears significant blame for our position on the precipice of fiscal disaster. However, Washington could not possibly spend all that money without the helping hand of big blue cities and the states where they have been sending those blank checks.
Programs like Medicaid, a near trillion-dollar-a-year welfare program that perpetually and dramatically overruns budget projections, are exploited by states that want the “federal revenue” to pour in with zero accountability for integrity, efficiency or outcomes. One out of every five dollars in that program is spent improperly, and without reform it is on track to waste $1 trillion in the next decade.
The food stamp program is another example of a program full of known fraud. The benefits — more than $100 billion a year — are funded by “federal money” but administered at the state level. Much can be blamed on bad behavior by D.C. bureaucrats, but bad decisions and a lack of oversight at the state level are contributing to the spending growth and the $11 billion wasted in the program in 2022.
States and cities eagerly gobble up federal grants and funding, with little thought to its impact on federal taxpayers present or future.
The result is massive inefficiencies, unsustainable budgets and a growing national debt we will be saddled with forever. Unless we act now. It is time to put a stop to this madness, and it can’t be done in D.C. alone.
Enter the state-level DOGE.
Just like the brain trust forming at federal DOGE, a state DOGE could be laser-focused on eliminating waste, reviewing spending and holding bureaucracies accountable. Here’s how it could work:
First, review all improper payments: State DOGE should conduct a review of all improper payments in the state and determine root causes for waste and fraud. These should be reported to the federal DOGE to assist them in making broader changes.
Second, no more unchecked regulations: State DOGE would require more regulations are eliminated then created, a zero-based approach to reset regulations, and legislative approval for any costly regulations.
Third, end the federal-grant gravy train: Federal DOGE will do some heavy lifting here by ending some of the most useless grants. That will be a good start. Federal grants are often a Trojan horse, bringing short-term benefits while locking states into long-term costs and bad policy. DOGE would meticulously review each federal grant coming into the state, ensuring it aligns with sound financial principles.
Fourth, cut the bureaucratic fat: DOGE would establish a more stringent review process for hiring government workers, slashing waste and ensuring that every employee serves an essential function. Hiring for vacant positions would require justification and long-term vacant government positions would be eliminated.
Fifth, legislative approval of federal program plans: Unelected bureaucrats in D.C. and in states shouldn’t implement costly federal programs without oversight. DOGE would mandate legislative approval for all state plans tied to federal programs, restoring control to elected representatives.
For too long, state legislatures have ceded power to unelected bureaucrats and federal overlords. A state-level DOGE project would flip the script, giving lawmakers the tools to rein in waste and hold agencies accountable while helping federal DOGE achieve its laudable goals for the country.
Conservatives in the states can seize the moment and momentum created by Trump and demand that state governments work for the people, not the bureaucracy. And while it may have started as an unserious internet meme, there is now more interest than ever in solving this serious problem. State policymakers should harness the movement to slash waste, curb overreach, and finally put taxpayers first.
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Sam Adolphsen is the policy director at the Foundation for Government Accountability. He served from 2015 to 2017 as the chief operating officer of the Maine Department of Health and Human Services.
Image “DOGE logo” by Elon Musk.
