JR Afternoon with Chris Renwick
What Will The Dept. Of Gov't Efficiency Look Like?
So Donald Trump has said Elon Musk and Vivek Ramaswami will lead his administration's efforts towards slashing, waste slashing, the bloat of the budget via the Department of Government Efficiency, doge. What does that actually look like in a practical sense? Let's talk to Dr. Joe Postel, the associate professor of politics at Hillsdale College. Doc, it's great to have you. Hey, Chris, thanks for having me on the program. So, explain to me what this is, because as I understand it, they're not technically government employees, but they're going to have a front row seat to what the government actually spends our money on. So when they go through with that red pen and start slashing things or finding those redundancies, what does this actually look like in a practical sense? Yeah, right now, to some extent, it's anybody's guess because we're still so early in the transition phase and obviously we'll find out more about this when we see the new administration early next year. But what it kind of looks like at this point is kind of an advisory committee. So it's not going to be a new department like the Department of Education or the Department of Commerce. It's really going to be something like an advisory committee that works out of the White House that might be funded out of the White House. There's something called the Executive Office of the President, where a lot of these White House officials are housed in the Eisenhower building right next to the West Wing. So it could be out of there. It might even be like a non-governmental advisory committee. We're not quite sure yet what it's going to look like. And even the scope of its review is actually still a little bit open to interpretation. So when you hear say like Elon talk about this, he talks about cutting $2 trillion out of the federal budget. He seems to really be wanting to focus on cutting federal spending. Whereas if you listen to Vivek from a Swami talk about it, the other sort of the co-chair of this proposed Department of Governmental Efficiency, he really wants to take on the administrative state. He thinks that we have too much regulation, it's sort of strangling the economy. And one of the best things we can do is actually cut back on regulation. So his view of like waste, fraud and abuse really is more about regulation than it is about spending. But I think they each have a different perspective on this problem. And I think they're really going to take a very big look comprehensively at the whole government and try to see where they can help. So when Donald Trump announced this, he said that Elon and Vivek will quote "dismantle government bureaucracy, slash excess regulations, cut wasteful expenditures, and restructural federal agencies." He also talked about this becoming potentially the Manhattan Project of our time. And we know the gravity of that situation. Is this a task that can be done in a year, two years, four years? I mean, it seems like this is such a Herculean effort. I understand, and quite frankly, I applaud the idea of looking at this and looking at where the redundancies are or where the wasteful spending is or where we can cut regulations. But this doesn't seem like this is a short-term fix to a much bigger issue. Right. Yeah. You know, the problem has been created over decades, so it's not going to be eliminated in 18 months. And this doge department has actually got an expiration date on it. It's obviously a very symbolic date. They're going to end on July 4th, 2026, so the 250th anniversary of the Declaration of Independence. So they've really got a short runway here to figure out all of the things that need to be fixed. And I really think this is kind of the first stage and what should be a much longer-term project that trying to make government more streamlines, trying to make government more efficient in terms of doing the things that actually contribute to the flourishing of the American people. So I don't think this can be done in a short period of time. Moreover, it really can't be done out of the White House. I mean, this is the biggest thing that hopefully they understand, is that you're going to need Congress to do a lot of the things that they're going to recommend. If you want to streamline agencies and restructure federal authority, cut back and dismantle the regulatory state, that's really going to require Congress to step in and pass legislation following up on the recommendations of this department. And if Donald Trump has the majority of the House and the majority of the Senate, you never know what happens in a midterm. So certainly these next two years will be really interesting. Do you believe, I mean, we haven't seen anything like this before, right? And when we haven't seen somebody kind of analytical like Elon Musk, where he is very fact-driven, he is very numbers-driven, there isn't a lot of gray area. He lives in that black and white. And obviously, we know about Vivek and kind of the stances that he takes, but we haven't seen something like this before. And if this is as big of an issue as I think it is, and as big of an undertaking as we agree it might be, is this something that you think would be sustainable long-term, that even if a Democrat were to win the White House, that this is something that they would continue to look into? That last part of that question, whether any Democrat, if they want a presidential election, would follow up with Vivek for it, I would be skeptical that that would happen. But I do think the bigger question here about whether this has really ever been done before, I think you're right, nothing on this scale. So there was something that the Reagan administration did during the latter, the second term of the Reagan administration in the '80s called the Grace Commission. And they had a few thousand recommendations for how to cut waste, fraud, and abuse, how to get rid of extra regulations that weren't necessary, how to have a better approach to federal procurement in the defense industry. So this sort of thing has been tried before, but it was always limited to waste, it was always limited to efficiency. What's really going on here is something much bolder. They really want to structure the entire modern state. They want to really go back to first principles. And so I think what's different about this approach versus some earlier approaches is there's a new understanding that this administrative state really represents a threat to the constitutional system and the basic principles on which America was founded. And I think that's part of a longer-term effort that is sustainable. You know, 20 years ago, nobody talked about the administrative state as a problem. And today, this is now in the highest realms of power where people are talking about this as a problem. So I think this is a sustainable effort. It's not obviously going to be done in one presidency, but more of this momentum going forward will help it to be sustainable. I think the other part too, and if we can get into the politics of this a little bit, you know, I think there was a lot of momentum behind the vague, filling JD Vancice in the state of Ohio. And Donald Trump has picked a lot of sitting representatives in the House, in the Senate, to fill administrative seats. And when you're dealing in the margins that they are, that can be really impactful. And if you're pulling, you know, for example, Elise Tefonic out of the state of New York, who does somebody like Kathy Hochl put in that spot, right? Maybe not somebody quite as bullish as Elise Tefonic. How does all of that then play into the type of majorities or the type of lawmakers that we'll see in Washington over the next coming days, really? Yeah. I think it creates a huge potential headache for the administration because, you know, you mentioned some members of the House of Representatives, obviously Matt Gates. Matt Gates is not one, sure. And then Lee Zeldin, who's a great member of the House of Representatives, who's now been tasked to run EPA. So you know, we don't even know how large the majority will be for the Republican Party. They're still counting votes in California, which is kind of astonishing, but it looks like it's going to be, you know, five or six seat majority in the House of Representatives. But if we've already counted three or four people who are being taken from the House of Representatives, you know, that makes the majority in the House really precarious. And I think that's going to be a concern if you ever need to pass legislation to carry out some of these proposals from this commitment, from this Department of Governmental Efficiency, you might actually run into trouble because you aren't going to have the votes in the House. And, you know, the Senate, of course, Rubio and Vance are going to be leaving the Senate. So that's going to be a priority in the first years, try to make sure that they're going to build. Yeah. Interesting stuff, Dr. Joe Postel at Hillsdale College. Thank you for your time. Appreciate you. Great to be with you. All right. We'll get you calls next 800-859-0957.
November 14, 2024 ~ Chris speaks with Hillsdale College, Associate Professor of Politics, Dr. Joe Postell about the soon-to-be-created Department of Government Efficiency. What it'll look like and what it'll be responsible for.