Melanie Stansbury Slams DOGE: It’s ‘Cost The Federal Government More Than It Actually Saved’

Forbes Breaking News

During Tuesday’s House Oversight Committee hearing, Rep. Melanie Stansbury (D-NM) spoke about the cost of DOGE to the federal government.

Transcript

00:00All right well good morning everyone welcome to the doge subcommittee notwithstanding the abject

00:08failure of the doge enterprise inside the federal government and the epic breakup of Elon Musk and

00:14Donald Trump here we are again once again in this committee I'm grateful that the chairwoman showed

00:20again one of my favorite videos which she showed on the first day of the subcommittee I'm grateful

00:25because it highlights the work that we've been doing for decades to root out waste fraud and

00:29abuse including work that I was intimately involved in as a budget examiner in the office of

00:35management and budget in which we actually eliminated waste fraud and abuse but unfortunately

00:41as my friends across the aisle and the GOP and their heritage foundation witnesses are still

00:47trying to make doge happen yet again the American people are over it in fact you don't have to take

00:55my word for it a poll from just two weeks ago found that 67 percent of voters believe doge has done a

01:03bad job that was just two weeks ago and in fact when I told one of my friends that we were having

01:08another doge subcommittee hearing they asked really is that still happening because literally the American

01:14people are over it except for that it's not funny because doge has been used to wage a chaotic destructive

01:21and ideological war against the American people and the vital programs that they depend on but I'm going

01:28to turn to that in just a moment here given everything that's happening in the world right now and with this

01:34administration I don't think we can sit here and pretend like everything is normal because just four

01:40days ago the president launched an unauthorized military attack in Iran without the consent of

01:46Congress putting our troops and our bases in harm's way as we saw just last night with the retaliatory

01:52bombing of one of our largest bases and madam chair I have actually been extremely grateful and

01:58wholeheartedly agree with your outspoken advocacy against this war but like so many in this administration

02:06so many days and weeks this follows weeks of chaos here at home as the president has deployed u.s marines

02:13and national guard on our own soil against our own people his dhs secretary and federal officials shoved a

02:20u.s senator to the ground doj indicted a sitting congresswoman in this house for doing her job

02:28and tried to arrest a new york city official in a federal courthouse this is not only not normal it is

02:35dangerous it is anti-american and it is anti-democratic and so we're not going to sit here

02:41today and pretend like what this administration is doing is normal and we're not going to sit here

02:47and pretend like doge is just some normal government program it is a scam in service of a political agenda

02:56while we came to the table at the beginning of this whole process in good faith with real ideas

03:02bipartisan ideas that folks have been working on for years and a desire to actually fix and modernize

03:07the federal government what we've seen from doge is the exact opposite it is so failed in its stated

03:14mission of saving money that even the president asked if it was bullshit as elon musk was exiting the

03:20building and if they want to talk about fiscal responsibility while we're sitting here they're still

03:27trying to pass a reconciliation bill across the aisle that would saddle taxpayers with 2.5 trillion

03:35dollars in deficit spending and in the last few weeks reports have revealed that doge may actually

03:42have cost the federal government more than it actually saved because of the mass firings dismantled

03:48agencies stolen data lawsuits agencies in chaos agencies that are not able to do their basic operational

03:55duties this is not efficiency this is a scam and that's not even to mention the completely reckless

04:03and needless suffering that doge has caused we're talking about millions of children and people across

04:09the planet who no longer will have access to food and medicine because of the very nine billion dollar

04:16rescission package that was just discussed thousands of veterans and public service member servants here at

04:22home whose lives have been shattered and millions of americans who've been impacted by the gutting of

04:27vital programs including staffing social security and now they're here today to try to make the case for

04:33making it permanent are you serious really are you serious i can't even believe my ears so why are they

04:42actually trying to make doge permanent well i think i think you have to look no further than the witnesses

04:48that they've called over the last several hearings including today we've got the heritage foundation

04:52and other authors and architects a project 2025 and so we have to be real about what this is actually

05:00about it's not about efficiency it's about a political agenda an ideological agenda about remaking

05:06the u.s government about remaking our economy and our society in line with a hyper conservative

05:13worldview that is so unpopular that even donald trump tried to distance himself from project 2025

05:19during the campaign and now he's hired over 70 officials to try to enact it and now they're

05:25trying to use this committee to make the case now they like to try to claim that they're taking on

05:31cancel culture and a woke agenda but let's be clear doge and the folks who want to make it permanent

05:38are the actual cancel culture because they want to cancel anything that they don't like or they

05:43don't agree with including your democratic rights and your freedoms economic opportunity and education

05:49lgbtq plus rights rolling back the clock on civil rights canceling the history of black chicano and

05:57indigenous communities and stripping protections from our families and the health care housing and food

06:04people depend on so that they can give more tax breaks to their friends but this is all part of a

06:11wider agenda that is now seeking to apply political purity tests to government programs and services

06:18including both federal employment and yes veteran services let me repeat that again even veterans

06:26benefits they want to apply political purity tests to your va benefits folks this is not

06:34about efficiency this is about eroding and privatizing our institutions gutting programs that keep our

06:42people and our country safe it's about rewriting history and remaking society to take us back decades

06:48if not centuries in short it's about making this country less free less democratic less prosperous and

06:56frankly consolidating power under trump and his allies who are becoming increasingly dangerous

07:03ideological and yes autocratic so we have to be clear-eyed about what is actually going on

07:11because this administration and its allies if they are willing to arrest and indict elected officials who

07:18are just doing their jobs including a u.s senator and a u.s congresswoman what will they do if we let them

07:26get away with it we cannot and we will not remain silent we have to continue to speak up

07:32to speak out and continue to stand together i yield back without objection

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