House DOGE Panel Fires Its First Salvo in ‘War on Waste’

The House Subcommittee on Delivering on Government Efficiency held its first hearing Tuesday as part of an investigation into the “war on waste” in the federal government.

Referred to as the DOGE Subcommittee, an arm of the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee, it is meant to run parallel to President Donald Trump and Elon Musk’s auditing of the federal government through the newly created Department of Government Efficiency.

Subcommittee Chairwoman Marjorie Taylor Greene, R-Ga., opened the hearing, “The War on Waste: Stamping Out the Scourge of Improper Payments and Fraud,” emphasizing the Trump administration’s efficiency initiatives as tools to address the ever-increasing national debt.

“No matter how bad the federal government fails the American people, it still takes your money, it still pays its own federal employees, and it never goes out of business,” said Greene. 

“This week, we turn our attention to improper payments by the federal government, including in Medicaid and Medicare. I’m looking forward to what we find out and how to solve this crisis,” she said.

The committee assembled four witnesses to testify under oath about fraudulent payments and waste in entitlement programs.

Haywood Talcove, the CEO of LexisNexis Risk Solutions for Government, received the most questions, as he spoke of bad actors illegally getting money from American entitlement programs by exploiting weak safeguards.

“Since 2003, federal agencies have reported approximately $2.7 trillion in cumulative improper payments, a staggering figure that underscores the persistent vulnerabilities across government programs,” Talcove said in his opening statement. 

Haywood Talcove (left) fielded questions on increasing security around entitlement programs at a House subcommittee hearing on Wednesday. (Bill Clark/CQ-Roll Call via Getty Images)

Talcove recommended using electronic verification systems that are standard in the private sector to crack down on this rampant fraud.

“The private sector has already demonstrated the effectiveness of these tools in stopping fraud before it occurs, and it is imperative that government agencies adopt them at scale,” he said.

Talcove spoke throughout the hearing on how “ghosts” from foreign countries use fake identities to rob money from U.S. taxpayers.

His remarks resonated with Rep. Tim Burchett, R-Tenn.

“The gravy train for a lot of these folks has been on biscuit wheels, and it’s about to run off the dadgum tracks, and it’s about time. Could you imagine defending waste, fraud, and abuse?” said Burchett, who asked Talcove to expand on his suggestions for reforming the programs. 

“It’s doing what the private sector does every single day. Whether you use your bank, you go to Amazon—using those tools and moving away from some of the dated compliance standards that the government uses,” Talcove responded.

“My number right now, between federal, state, and local government is you can save $1 trillion a year by simply putting in front-end identity verification, eliminating self-certification, and monitoring the back end of the programs that are providing the benefits … . They’ll take that 20% fraud rate that you’re seeing in the public sector down below 5%.”

Burchett then recommended to Greene that they get Talcove’s proposals out of committee so that Congress might adopt it as legislation as soon as possible.

But Democrats on the subcommittee were not pleased with the hearing.

Rep. Robert Garcia, D-Calif., went on a rant against the influence of Elon Musk in the government, making a crude joke as he said he would show the audience a “d—k pic” and displayed an image of Musk’s face.

“We should in no way be cooperating with House Republicans who want to shut down the Department of Education and destroy Medicare and Medicaid. And we should not stand by as the richest man on the planet gives himself and his companies huge tax cuts while the American people get absolutely nothing,” said Garcia.

Democrats also criticized President Donald Trump’s recent firings of agency inspectors general. Rep. Greg Casar, D-Texas, used his time to oppose that.

“This subcommittee is supposedly about looking into waste, fraud, and abuse. So, I’d like to start talking about independent inspector generals who are supposed to be looking into waste, fraud, and abuse.”

Casar proceeded to contend that Musk was pushing for the firing of inspectors general in order to prevent investigations of his companies.

After the hearing, Greene rejected criticism of these firings, saying, “The president, he can fire anyone he wants, and certainly with $36 trillion in debt … . If the president wants to fire inspector generals, if he wants to fire anyone, it’s up to him, and it’s his purview to do it.”

Rep. Eric Burlison, D-Mo., likewise said after the hearing, “Every president comes in and replaces the political appointees, the inspector generals with their inspector generals. So, this is not new.”

Burlison told The Daily Signal of these tense moments, “I think the ad hominem attacks are ridiculous. They’re at a place where—how do you justify all of these expenses?”

Greene also complained of the divide between Republicans and Democrats on the subcommittee.

“I heard a few of the Democrat members in there sounded serious about it. But I also saw some others use their five minutes to attack President Trump, attack Elon Musk, attack me, and basically make political theater of the whole thing,” the Georgia lawmaker said, adding: “If they want to make this a place to create partisan attacks and future campaign ads, they’re really going to be on the losing side of the issue.”

At the end of the hearing, Rep. Melanie Stansbury, D-N.M., criticized Republicans for what she sees as hypocrisy in terms of fighting debt, while pushing to raise the debt ceiling in the budget reconciliation process.

“We spent two hours being lectured about fiscal responsibility, while the leadership of the Republicans in the House released a fiscal plan that would blow out spending and raise the debt ceiling like $4 trillion. That’s ridiculous,” Stansbury quipped to the Daily Signal as she walked out of the hearing.

Rep. Brian Jack, R-Ga., rejected New Mexico Democratic Rep. Melanie Stansbury’s criticism of Republican fiscal policy. (Bill Clark/CQ-Roll Call via Getty Images)

Rep. Brian Jack, R-Ga., rejected that narrative in an interview with The Daily Signal, saying, “We are trying to accomplish one of the most historic pieces of legislation in the first three or four months of this term, and I think we all anticipate unrelenting growth under President Trump’s agenda over the next four years that will overcome any deficit that Melanie Stansbury was talking about.”

Burlison partly agreed with the criticism of the Republican leadership, but argued that addressing the debt would be a longer process.

“You’re not going to stop this freight train on a dime. You’re not going to stop it immediately. It’s going to take some time. And because of that, it’s understandable that you’re going to need to give some room on the debt ceiling. That being said, we shouldn’t celebrate, we should mourn raising the debt ceiling. And we will,” he said.

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