Trump is doing a lot of things: abandoning allies in Europe to make nice with Vladimir Putin, making racism not just acceptable but required, turning the U.S. into a pariah nation that is making every American less safe. Some of his moves are confusing. Others are done for purposes that may seem obscure. However, there is one thing that everyone can understand:
Donald Trump is stealing from you.
He's stealing from you. He's stealing from your family. He's stealing from your friends. He's stealing from your children. He is stealing your property, your services, and your savings. And he is doing it in almost every way imaginableâincluding some that should be impossible in any functional government.
This is the biggest daylight robbery in history, and the only way to stop it is to stop Trump.
He is stealing the public services you've already paid for to create profit centers
What may be the most obvious theft that has taken place in the first month of unprecedented corrupt is centered around the so-called "Department of Government Efficiency." Under the guise of saving the nation money, Elon Musk and his team of teenage vandals have fired government employees, sold off government properties, canceled major government contracts, and closed down whole departments.
Musk has put up numbers claiming that this has saved the government billions and Trump has repeatedly cited these numbers in posts and speeches. All those numbers have been lies.
The truth is that none of this is about saving money or making the government more efficient. First, it's about claiming DOGE has saved the government oodles of cash in order to make the $4.5 trillion tax break for billionaires seem more palatable. Secondly, it's about taking away the services the government now provides and turning them into opportunities for profit â with Trump doling out those services to his favorites.
The term for this is oligarchy. And that's what DOGE is really about.
DOGE has canceled numerous contracts that saved the government no money and sent home thousands of employees who are still being paid. That's not putting any money into the government coffers, no matter how many sticky notes Musk puts on his "savings board." He's killing the services, not the costs.
No-savings items aren't just a line or two on DOGE's big board of claimed victories. It's almost 40% of everything DOGE has cut.
Some of the canceled contracts were for research studies that have been awarded, training that has taken place, software that has been purchased and interns who have come and gone.
Even if DOGE isn't really finding billions in fraud, they have certainly opened the door for lots of money to change hands. Every time they halt an already paid-for consulting agreement, tell a government office performing a vital service to take a hike, or leave medical supplies to rot in warehouses even though the full cost of delivery had already been covered, it creates a need. That need won't be filled by the existing agency or the people already doing the job. Those government services will be replaced with brand new, for-profit, praise capitalism and pass the checkbook, contracts signed over to The Friends of Donald Trump and Elon Musk, Inc.
DOGE's actual savings are nothing compared to the huge tax cut Republicans are about to award the wealthy.
"Think of Congress and its budget as the debt-ridden dad on the way to buy a $250,000 Ferrari on the credit card, and DOGE is the $2-off gas card he used along the way," [Jessica Riedl] said. "It's great that he saved $2 on gas, but I think his wife may be more concerned about the $250,000 car."
As NPR reports, DOGE isn't even looking at the places where significant savings might exist. They're too busy chasing down right-wing boogymen and advancing false claimsâclaims that just happen to leave vital gaps someone else can fill for the right money. Whether it's hurricane warnings from NOAA or the agricultural purchases made by USAID, these things aren't actually going to stop long term ... they're just going to have new owners.
Not only do the DOGE savings not exist, some will cost the governmentâmeaning cost youâimmediately. Despite what Trump and Musk may claim, many government agencies are highly efficient at delivering services for the American people, and government employees are paid an average of 25% less than their corporate equivalents. The only way that private companies can handle this is to either charge more or provide less.
Trump is certain to brag about how much cheaper these private services will be ... so long as no one looks at the details. Or notices that contract prices go up faster than a Netflix subscription.
Musk is already costing the nation dearly. And that's not just when DOGE accidentally fires the people in charge of nuclear bombs and then spends weeks trying to hire them back. Every time DOGE delays a shipment, interferes with research, or dismisses experts with years of experience the loss is severe. Some of these cuts will damage the nation for decades, even if everything DOGE had done were to be reversed tomorrow.
What Trump is doing through DOGE is usurping a power that belongs uniquely to Congress. In fact, the "power of the purse" that defined the staffing and budgets of the various government agencies, may be the biggest power that Congress holds. Republicans have given that away.
By rewriting the rules, Trump can dip into government contracts that have already been awarded and carve out chunks for himself, his family, and his billionaire pals. For example, the Commerce Department is rewriting plans that would have ensured rural Americans have a diverse set of choices for high-speed internet and is turning that into a $900 million gift for Musk. That same deal could expand into a $42 billion payday. Expect the same thing to happen at NASA, where SLS rockets that have already been paid for and built are likely to be shelved.
DOGE is going to pretend to save money, Republicans are going to help turn billionaires into trillionaires, and everything you now expect from the government is going to turn into a service that costs you more and gives you less.
"Efficiency" in business means simply making a higher profit by employing fewer people and charging as much as the market will bear. Corporate efficiency has exactly zero to do with serving the public good or giving Americans what they need. That's not even in the picture.
And DOGE isn't even delivering corporate efficiency. Oligarchs don't have to be efficient. Robbery has a low overhead.
If you want an example of how this is going to operate, watch the Department of Education. Republicans have long been trying to sink public education and replace it with private schools that have next to no rulesâexcept to generate profitâfor decades. At the time of this writing, Trump was poised to eliminate the Department of Education. Technically, he can't do that, because the department was created by an act of Congress in 1979. But since Congress has gotten down on its knees for Trump, don't expect them to start waving the Constitution. Even though Trump can't technically delete the DOE, congressional Republicans will look the other way while he does it anyway.
The Department of Education, contrary to Republican claims, isn't charged with forcing schools to offer students cat litter in the bathroom or ripping the Founding Fathers out of history books. What it actually does is manage the $1.5 trillion in student loan debt that Republicans would not let Joe Biden eliminate. It oversees Pell Grants for underprivileged students and the system by which colleges apply for federal aid. It doesn't accredit colleges. It doesn't choose textbooks. But it does provide federal funding to schools in low-income areas, funding for disabled students, and enforcement of Civil Rights laws.
When Republicans say they want to send all this "back to the states," what they really mean is they want all the scrutiny to go away and leave the money behind. Someone will make a fresh fortune administering those loans. Someone will get great joy out of shredding those checks headed for low-income schools and rerouting them to wealthy white parents looking to upgrade their kid's prep school.
That way, private schools can do the job they were always designed to do: Put a happy face over segregation.
Trump's Department of Education plans will provide a boost to Republican governors in several states that are ripping funds away from public education and rewarding wealthy supporters who already send their kids to private schools. It will force public schoolsâespecially those in low-income areasâto find money to cover lost federal funds. Many of those schools will not find those funds. What remains of public education will get worse. By design.
Privatizing the functions of the Department of Education will do what Republicans have long desired: Turn public schools into warehouses for kids who can't get into private schools because of reasons. Reasons like too poor, too disabled, or too Black. At the same time, tens of billions will pour into the bank accounts of wealthy Americans who were never going to send their kids to public schools--and the accounts of the corporations behind those private schools.
That's one example from one department. What's happening now with the Department of Education is going to be repeated all across the federal government as Trump, Musk, and the rest of the vulture administration pick over the bones of the federal government for any morsel of potential profit.
The Post Office? Why, that sure looks tasty.
At the FAA, Trump has ordered the agency to take tens of millions of dollars dedicated to other purposes and simply hand it over to Musk to replace a service they already purchased. Meanwhile, Trump is setting Musk up to take over the FAA, using the disasters that have happened in the few weeks since he took charge as an excuse to destroy a vital instrument of public safety. Please just ignore the exploding Starships scattered across the sky or the airports closed because of falling debris.
How are things going to be once everything is privatized? How much joy do you get from dealing with your insurance company or trying to contact the service department at your phone company? Now imagine that level of complexity, denial, and neglect applied to everything that is, and should be, a public service. Anyone who has complained about government bureaucrats has never tried to get help for an HP printer. Or find a human being at Amazon. Or end any of those subscriptions that were oh-so-easy to start.
Putting all these services in the hands of a wealthy few will generate billions for them. But not for you. You're going to end up paying much more while getting much less. And you're going to be paying a whole lot more because every one of these new private services is going to be in search of one thing: Profit.
But don't worry. Even if DOGE's savings aren't real, Musk's teenagers are already getting paid very well to steal services from youâand you're paying those salaries too.
These services, which you have counted on every minute of your life even when you didn't know it, are being stolen from you so that Trump's friends can turn them into profit centers.
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