Staff Reports
The Department of Government Efficiency, affectionately dubbed DOGE, is making headlines as it sets its sights on slashing wasteful spending within the Education Department. Those who thought the federal government had run out of absurd contracts to terminate were sorely mistaken. Recently, DOGE announced the cancellation of 89 contracts totaling a staggering $881 million, proving that in the realm of federal waste, there’s always more to clean up.
The cuts include a particular gem, where a contractor pocketed $1.5 million just to “observe mailing and clerical operations” at a mail center. This makes one wonder if the contractor had a magic magnifying glass dedicated solely to observing envelopes. The irony, of course, is that the left continues to defend spending on programs that seem batty at best while real issues in education are blatantly ignored.
Notably absent from the discussion were the 29 grants linked to the left’s favorite trio: diversity, equity, and inclusion training. It’s high time to recognize that throwing money at training sessions about how to be inclusive does little to help students who can’t read, right? Critics of DOGE’s move lament this approach, insisting that the Education Department is incapable of serving its intended purpose without such funding. To them, education research has become the sacred cow, despite two decades of educational stagnation.
While the Education Department has taken a rivet to the budget, the dire reading scores among American students scream for solutions rather than bureaucratic bloating. Some observers have implied that with the release of new federal testing data showing staggering deficiencies, these cuts target research pertinent to issues like absenteeism and student behavior—issues that have clearly escalated post-COVID. But why not keep funding the research of tried-and-failed programs when there’s a perfectly capable DOGE to scrutinize the efficiency of government spending?
DOGE Is Taking a Chainsaw to the Failed Education Department
https://t.co/N2CpnQ666k— Townhall.com (@townhallcom) February 11, 2025
The reaction from the left has been swift and dramatic, with Sen. Patty Murray leading the charge against Elon Musk, who seems to have found a way to supersede educational malpractice with a budget-cutting, give-the-kids-a-chance philosophy. To hear Murray tell it, it’s almost as if a personal affront has been dealt with the slashing of contracts and grants, but perhaps those contracts deserved a clear-eyed evaluation.
With President Trump expected to take more decisive action soon to phase out the Education Department, it seems like the bloated behemoth of ineffective policies is finally meeting its reckoning. Let’s be real: the Education Department has had decades to prove itself, and yet math and reading proficiency levels remain stagnant while taxpayer dollars continue to pour into a black hole of liberal agendas. Perhaps it’s time to consider that the only thing this department has really educated anyone on is how to waste money on initiatives that do nothing for students. As the curtain draws on this chapter, it might just reveal that less is indeed more, especially where education is concerned.
