00:00And with that, I yield to the ranking member Stansbury for her opening statement.
00:06All right. Well, good afternoon, everyone. Welcome, indeed, to the Doge subcommittee. It's always an interesting journey here.
00:15Madam Chairwoman, before we get started, I want to take a moment to observe that this very subcommittee was created in January
00:21to act as the congressional tip of the spear for Doge and Elon Musk's efforts inside the federal government.
00:30Which our GOP colleagues were falling all over themselves to get in on the action.
00:36And, in fact, I don't know if you know this, Madam Chairwoman, but one of your own GOP members who couldn't get on the committee
00:43actually contacted me to see if I could help because they were so desperate to participate in this activity.
00:52But here we are. I feel like we should play a breakup song in the midst of the breakup of the GOP with Elon Musk and Doge.
00:59And yet, still, the zombie lurches on.
01:03And, you know, I think it's interesting that people are barely saying his name in these halls.
01:08And this subcommittee barely has any credibility at this point.
01:12And Elon Musk still hasn't appeared under oath in front of this committee or anybody here in Congress.
01:19And, in fact, Donald Trump himself apparently asked his own aides this week if Doge was, and I quote the president, bullshit.
01:30Donald Trump asked if Doge was bullshit.
01:34Meanwhile, our friend Mr. Musk is going crazy on Twitter.
01:37We just checked. He's still going at it.
01:39And he literally has been tweet-storming the GOP for the last 24 hours.
01:46And he says, I'm sorry, but I just can't stand it anymore.
01:51This massive, outrageous, pork-filled congressional spending bill is a disgusting abomination.
01:57Shame on those who voted for it.
01:59You know you did wrong.
02:01You know it.
02:02And, you know, what I find interesting about his tweet is that he says, I'm sorry, I just can't stand it anymore.
02:06And I think, you know, the American people have been there for the last three and a half months
02:12as they've dismantled the federal government, as Musk and Trump and his friends here have helped lay wake to the federal government,
02:24dismantling federal agencies, firing thousands of federal workers, stealing your private data,
02:31costing the federal government millions of dollars.
02:34And, in fact, it appears that they may have actually cost more money than they apparently saved.
02:39So it's hard to take any of this seriously or with any credibility.
02:46Musk lied about Doge and its savings.
02:48The president and the speaker just this morning, once again, lied about the big abomination of the bill and the deficit spending in it.
02:55There was a misrepresentation of a witness in this hearing last time.
03:01There was lies about the budget reconciliation and, yes, the Doge package, which was transmitted to Congress yesterday.
03:09And I don't think I even need to comment on the wild journey of baseless conspiracy theories that we just heard.
03:15So it's very clear that Doge has made America less safe, less secure, undermined our global and national security,
03:24compromised our data privacy, impacted our ability to serve our vulnerable communities, and left the government in total chaos.
03:31And yet, many of these Doge brothers have implanted themselves inside of federal agencies and are now answering directly to the West Wing and to the Director of Office of Management and Budget, Mr. Russell Vogt,
03:48who, by the way, is testifying just across this campus on his bill for the FY26 budget, which would eviscerate these programs.
03:57So I want to say, first, they came for our federal agencies.
04:01Then they came for our judges and law firms and the rule of law.
04:05Then they came for the free press and your freedom of speech.
04:08Then they came for higher education and our children.
04:11Then they came for congressional offices, and now, here they are, coming for civil society and nonprofit organizations.
04:21What are nonprofit organizations?
04:23Food banks, legal aid clinics, homeless shelters, organizations that are the glue of our communities.
04:30In fact, right now, they are withholding a half trillion dollars illegally from nonprofit organizations that provide services for our communities.
04:40Public safety, health services, housing, the Big Brothers and Big Sisters of America, Boys and Girls Club, and Habitat for Humanity.
04:48Is this the dark money scare that we're hearing across the aisle?
04:53I think all of us understand what these organizations do in our communities.
04:59But let us be clear, the actions that are happening here in this committee, and which the administration are trying to execute through executive actions, through letters, and yes, sending Doge employees baselessly and illegally into nonprofit organizations, are illegal.
05:18They lack moral authority, and they lack legal authority.
05:22The truth is simple, neither the president nor any other executive branch official has the power to unilaterally revoke an organization's tax-exempt status, or to use these authoritarian tactics to try to intimidate our nonprofit and civil society organizations.
05:42And we will dive deeper into that topic and your rights during this hearing.
05:47But if my colleagues across the aisle want to talk about dark money networks, we can look no further than this very hearing room.
05:54Because if we actually want to understand the dark money funded networks that are making the government run right now, let's talk about Project 2025, the witnesses who are here today as part of the organizations that helped to craft it.
06:07Mr. Vote, who was at the helm as the architect of that document, and the folks who are inside the federal government right now, dismantling our agencies and attacking every aspect of our democracy.
06:22We will not stand for it.
06:24And with that, Madam Chairwoman, I yield back.
