This Utah lawmaker will help lead Congress’ work with DOGE to cut government spending

Utah Rep. Blake Moore announced he will head the congressional caucus responsible for getting Elon Musk and Vivek Ramaswamy’s Delivering Outstanding Government Efficiency, or DOGE, initiative off the ground.

As co-chair of the House DOGE Caucus for the 119th Congress, Moore said he will “funnel feedback” directly to Musk and Ramaswamy and serve as a “conduit” for information about lawmakers’ previous efforts to streamline government programs so DOGE doesn’t have to start from scratch.

“We don’t have to reinvent the wheel on some things,” Moore said. “We just need the wheel of the White House to be willing to address its own administration and agencies.”

DOGE meets with Congress

The DOGE Caucus, including Moore, and his co-chairs, Reps. Aaron Bean, R-Fla., and Pete Sessions, R-Texas, met with Musk and Ramaswamy on Thursday for an introductory meeting to brainstorm approaches to increase government efficiency. Prior to the House meeting, Musk and Ramaswamy met with the Senate DOGE Caucus, of which Utah Sen. Mike Lee is a member.

Moore’s colleagues highlighted the Department of Education and the redundancy of government employees as topics of discussion in the closed-door meeting. But Moore said “everything has to be on the table,” including efficiency in the Department of Defense and the ability to vote on mandatory spending.

During the meeting, Moore said he explained to Musk and Ramaswamy that automatically renewing programs make up 75% of the budget, and sometimes grow by up to 15% a year, and are never voted on.

Moore campaigned heavily on “reversing Washington’s debt culture.” Within four years of entering Congress, he has risen to GOP conference vice chair and sits on the influential Budget Committee and Ways and Means Committee, which oversees tax policy.

As a non-congressionally approved body, DOGE will have advisory but no policymaking authority, Moore said. Even with this restriction, Moore said President-elect Donald Trump’s creation of DOGE marks a big difference from his reluctance to tackle debt reduction during his first term.

“It ultimately comes down to President Trump,” Moore said. “I’m hopeful that as he’s elevated these two individuals that that shows he’s serious about it, because there’s a lot of us in Congress that are very serious about it, and this might be the moment.”

Can DOGE cross the aisle?

Some have criticized Musk and Ramasmway — both billionaire entrepreneurs — for thinking they can enact sweeping changes to government structure and spending without having any previous experience in the institutions involved. Democrat Rep. Maxwell Frost of Florida called the whole idea a “joke.”

But Moore’s biggest takeaway from his meeting with the world’s richest man and the former GOP presidential candidate was their openness to feedback. The close advisers of Trump both displayed “humility” and a desire to “sincerely listen” as congressional Republicans presented ideas to them, Moore said. Ramaswamy even made an appeal for GOP attendees to involve more Democrats in DOGE-related conversations, according to Moore.

DOGE and its affiliated congressional caucus has shown a glimmer of bipartisan appeal. Progressive California Rep. Ro Khanna made headlines on Thursday with his declaration of support for DOGE’s mission and his willingness to cooperate with Musk and Ramaswamy to “slash waste.” Democratic socialist Sen. Bernie Sanders said he also supports DOGE for its aim to clean out the defense budget. And Rep. Jared Moskowitz, D-Fla., became the first Democrat to join the DOGE caucus on Thursday.

One way to bring more Democrats into the DOGE fold, Moore said, is to compare it to the National Partnership for Reinventing Government launched in 1993 by Vice President Al Gore with the goal of reducing government bureaucracy. The initiative led to the elimination of hundreds of thousands of federal jobs and the consolidation or elimination of hundreds of programs and agencies.

Will DOGE unite or divide Republicans?

However, one obstacle to Democratic buy-in could be the appointment of controversial Georgia Republican Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene to chair the newly created DOGE subcommittee which will operate under the House Oversight Committee. Moore said this role will mostly allow Greene to conduct hearings to obtain congressional testimony.

Following Musk and Ramaswamy’s meeting with House Republicans, Greene said they would be making a “naughty list and a nice list” to hold representatives accountable for how they vote on spending proposals.

But what Moore hopes DOGE does is unite Republicans to achieve their longstanding goals of integrating mandatory spending programs into the budget process, eliminate Congress’ annual $2 trillion deficit and achieve a balanced budget.

“This is going to be the biggest catalyst and opportunity that I’ve seen in my time to be able to do something like that,” said Moore, who was elected in 2020 to represent the 1st Congressional District.