The DOGE inspired bill that could break—or cement—Trump’s govt overhaul | World News

In the early hours of Thursday morning, US Vice President JD Vance cast a tie-breaking vote that advanced one of the most contentious pieces of legislation in President Donald Trump’s second term – a $9 billion federal spending rollback pitched as a return to fiscal sanity.
The bill, now before the House, is the first major victory for Trump’s embattled Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) initiative, a cost-cutting crusade born of Silicon Valley bravado and steered until recently Elon Musk.
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The legislation slashes funding for foreign aid, public broadcasting, and what the White House calls “politicized bureaucracy.”
Roughly $8 billion will be withdrawn from international aid and development programs, while another $1.1 billion is set to disappear from the Corporation for Public Broadcasting, a longtime Republican target that helps fund NPR and PBS.
Vance defended the cuts as necessary to “restore fiscal sanity” and eliminate “ideologically slanted” or inefficient programs that no longer served national interests.
The Trump adminration argues that such sacrifices are necessary to restore fiscal discipline. Supporters ins the bill trims fat, not muscle. But humanitarian groups and international health advocates warn of consequences far more severe: disrupted vaccination programs, halted food aid shipments, shuttered water projects, and damaged diplomatic relationships.Story continues below this ad
“This could cripple efforts to fight preventable disease,” one aid official said, “and leave America looking callous.”
Even some within the GOP have expressed quiet discomfort with the method, if not the mission. Senator Lisa Murkowski described the process as “agonizing,” voicing concern about the impact on rural health care in her state. Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell also broke ranks, voting with Democrats.
This may be a pyrrhic win for DOGE, the once-feared government efficiency team created Musk. Since Trump returned to office, DOGE has been granted unprecedented authority to fire employees, shred contracts, and cancel funding streams. At its peak, DOGE promised to slash $2 trillion from the federal budget. That number has since been revised down to $150 billion.
But the team’s trajectory has been anything but smooth. According to The Wall Street Journal and Politico, at least eight senior DOGE staffers have quit, been sidelined, or had their contracts terminated following Musk’s acrimonious departure from the White House. Once considered Trump’s ‘first buddy,’ Musk has become an unpredictable critic.Story continues below this ad
Meanwhile, Trump himself has begun to show signs of DOGE fatigue. “I would have done it differently, a little bit, maybe,” he told a Cabinet meeting. That came after a string of social media attacks on Musk, including calling him a “TRAIN WRECK over the past five weeks.”
Inside government buildings, the Musk imprint is fading. Where once there were armed guards and restricted floors, there are now empty cubicles and elevator buttons with no special markings. Many of Musk’s reforms, particularly efforts to gut federal agencies and programs like DEI initiatives, have been blocked courts or reversed Congress. Others simply collapsed under their own weight.
Yet DOGE has not entirely disappeared. Former DOGE operatives have been embedded in departments like Energy, Interior, and the EPA, where they continue to quietly influence policy. “The mission of eliminating waste, fraud, and abuse is part of the DNA of the federal government,” said White House spokesman Harrison Fields, “and will continue under the direction of the president, his cabinet, and agency heads.”
Still, the president is pressing forward with his cost-cutting vision – if now on his own terms.Story continues below this ad
The House must pass the bill Friday to meet the procedural deadline. If it does, it will head to Trump’s desk for a signature he’s all but guaranteed to give. The DOGE initiative may be bruised, but its ethos of slash-and-burn austerity, repackaged in legislative form, appears poised to succeed.