In the last few days, Donald Trump’s Department of Government Efficiency (“DOGE”) has effectively put an end to USAID, gelded the General Services Administration (GSA) tech division, the Office of Personnel Management (OPM), and the Treasury, and fired corrupt people in the FBI—and that’s just the short list. With the war on USAID, GSA, OPM, and the Treasury alone, DOGE is saving taxpayers at a rate of one billion per day. All of this has driven the Democrats into a frenzy as they insist that an elected president managing the government is a coup. Unfortunately for them (but not for us), they don’t have a legal leg to stand on.
President Kennedy founded USAID via Executive Order 10973 in November 1961: “Administration of Foreign Assistance and Related Functions.” It was meant to be a permanent clearing house that would work with the State Department to distribute money intended to help advance technology and financial competence in low-income countries. It reflected the fact that, in 1961, the U.S. was still the last country standing after WWII. The vision was to benefit America by fortifying poor countries against Soviet depredation.
And one last legal concept: President Trump has appointed DOGE and Elon Musk to act as his agents when it comes to reasserting executive control over government agencies. Agents acting within the scope of their assigned agency have the same authority as the principal.
It looks like what Trump is doing with DOGE and Elon Musk is legal and constitutional, within the bounds of what the founders thought and set up as the government and actually acted upon. Agency is very powerful and undeniable. I think that any challenges to what Trump and Musk are doing are going to run into a buzz saw first and through the woodchipper next. We are in for fun times and smaller federal government, don’t know about states, though.