WASHINGTON — President Trump mentioned Friday that Elon Musk’s Division of Authorities Effectivity (DOGE) initiative will take a look at the Protection Division’s huge price range after making vital cuts at different federal companies — most notably the US Company for Worldwide Growth (USAID) — whereas charging that critics of the trouble “don’t love our nation.”
“Pentagon, Training, nearly the whole lot. We’re going to undergo the whole lot,” Trump mentioned at a joint White Home press convention with visiting Japanese Prime Minister Shigeru Ishiba.
“It was so dangerous, with what we simply went by way of — with this horrible state of affairs we simply went by way of, and I assume 97% of the folks have been dismissed,” Trump mentioned, referring to huge headcount reductions at USAID that had been on account of take impact at 11:59 p.m. Friday.
“It was very, very unlucky. You’re not going to seek out something like that, however you’re going to seek out lots. And I’ve instructed him to go try Training, to take a look at the Pentagon, which is the navy. And you understand, sadly, you’ll discover some issues which might be fairly dangerous,” the president went on.
The Pentagon has the biggest quantity of federal discretionary spending — and an notorious historical past of overpayments, reminiscent of spending $10,000 on rest room seat covers for Air Power cargo planes, an outlay which was resulted in 2018 after it turned public.
Trump added, in reference to the sweeping USAID grant and staffing cuts: “I don’t suppose proportionally you’re going to see something like we simply noticed.”
Musk’s DOGE initiative has seen a gaggle of younger staffers poring over spending at companies, with the world’s richest man spotlighting many instances of alleged waste on X, which he owns.
Trump mentioned within the Oval Workplace earlier Friday that USAID’s spending was largely “corrupt or ridiculous” and added that “the entire thing is a fraud.”
“Elon is doing an ideal job. He’s discovering super fraud and corruption and waste,” the president mentioned earlier than providing new insights into how Musk’s roving and murky cost-cutting initiative is working.
“I’ll inform him to go right here or there and he does it,” Trump defined. “He’s bought a really succesful group of individuals.
“They’ll ask questions and so they’ll see instantly, if any person will get tongue-tied, that they’re both crooked or don’t know what they’re doing.”
The president repeated that: “I’ll select a goal and I’ll say, ‘Go in.’ There could possibly be areas that we don’t, however I feel the whole lot’s fertile. , we’re a authorities. We’ve got to be open.”
In response to a reporter’s query, Trump repeated his common insistence that “Social Safety is not going to be touched,” however famous that unlawful immigrants can be minimize off if discovered to be receiving advantages.
Democrats have railed in opposition to Musk’s initiative — with lawmakers protesting exterior the Training Division Friday afternoon after stories swirled that it might be subsequent to be pared down.
Requested in regards to the protest, Trump groused: “I see Maxine Waters, a low-life, I see all these folks, they don’t love our nation.”
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