A lot of things happened. Here are some of the things. This is TPM’s Morning Memo. Sign up for the email version.
What DOGE Cost Us
Democrats on the Senate Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations yesterday released a jaw-dropping report attempting to document the scope and scale of financial waste, personnel upheaval, and human suffering caused by the so-called Department of Government Efficiency and Elon Musk’s giddily uninformed strike force of Peter Thiel acolytes. In all, the Democrats, led by Richard Blumenthal (CT), estimated DOGE cost the government $21.7 billion.
“DOGE-generated waste could also have easily funded monthly food assistance for the 5.3 million families losing an average of $146 in monthly food security assistance ($9.3 billion per year) under the new budget; or it could have been used more broadly to support the 40 percent of taxpayers that will see a net increase to their taxes as a direct result of the Trump tax plan,” the report contends.
Major news coverage focused on the cost of the government paying over 150,000 federal workers who accepted the Trump administration’s deferred resignation incentives, under which they had to stop working but are continuing to be paid through September or even December. The minority’s report, which estimated that 200,000 workers took these buyouts, calculated that paying workers for not working cost the government $14.8 billion.
Neither the buyouts nor paying workers while on administrative leave (costing an additional $6.1 billion) increased government efficiency, as was always obvious and predictable. The report details many other costs, from the petty and pointless (millions of hours of wasted employee time writing the Musk-required email listing their weekly accomplishments) to the catastrophic (the elimination of the United States Agency for International Development, “projected to cause millions of additional deaths globally while simultaneously endangering domestic public health by reducing essential medical staff and programs.”)
As it rampaged through the government, DOGE destroyed valuable assets, wasting money already set aside to be spent, or depriving the government of income-generating programs. Product spoilage of USAID supplies of food and medicines cost the government nearly $10 million. DOGE’s elimination of the Internal Revenue Service’s Direct File program, the report estimates, wasted a more than $33 million investment in it, not to mention that taxpayers no longer have a free electronic filing option. DOGE caused the loss of more than $263 million of interest and fee income by shutting down Department of Energy loans from a program to modernize the electricity grid. The actual cost of the mass cancellations of medical research grants at the National Institutes of Health has yet to be fully calculated.
This summary represents a fraction of the entire report, and much is still not even known about the scope of the DOGE destruction. Yesterday, Blumenthal wrote to the inspectors general at 27 agencies, requesting they “initiate a comprehensive review of DOGE’s activities within your agency in order to determine the full scope of costs that DOGE’s careless actions have imposed,” particularly “the financial impact of the reorganization of federal agencies through mass layoffs, the canceling of grants, contracts, and other projects for partisan reasons, and the stifling of income-generating activities.”
Is MAGA Turning on Trump over Israel?
I spotted two stories this week in the inside-the-Beltway press, one in Politico and the other in Axios, suggesting MAGA is turning on Trump because of his continued support of the Netanyahu regime and its assault on Gaza that even Israeli human rights organizations have called a genocide. The Axios piece even suggests a “GOP realignment” on the issue may be underway. The Politico piece is more measured on that possibility, but neither piece mentions the critical role of Christian Zionists — that is, evangelicals who vigorously support Israel’s far right, like Ambassador to Israel Mike Huckabee — in the Trump coalition.
It is hard to know now this possible coalitional split will play out. In the meantime, can we talk about how the MAGA figures turning against Israel are saying things that have gotten foreign students detained and universities’ funding cut off?
Federal Trial Judges Speak Out About Violent Threats, Fueled by Trump Tirades
At a panel discussion hosted by Speak up for Justice, a group advocating for the safety of an independent judiciary, federal judges who have ruled against the Trump administration described the violent threats they and family members have received as a result. Judge Esther Salas, a federal judge in New Jersey whose son was murdered by a litigant in 2020, described the increase in threats as Trump has escalated his invectives against the bench. “I’ve often referred to it as a bonfire that I believe the current administration is throwing accelerants on,” Salas told the Associated Press.
D.C. Bar Panel Recommends Disbarment of Jeffrey Clark, Who Promoted Overturning 2020 Election
The D.C. Bar’s Board on Professional Responsibility singled out his dishonesty as the core reason for recommending the most severe punishment for Clark:
Respondent was prepared to cause the Justice Department to tell a lie about the status of its investigation of an important national issue (the integrity of the 2020 Presidential election). Lawyers cannot advocate for any outcome based on false statements and they certainly cannot urge others to do so. Respondent persistently and energetically sought to do just that on an important national issue. He should be disbarred as a consequence and to send a message to the rest of the Bar and to the public that this behavior will not be tolerated.
Justice Department Inspector General Claims to Have Lost a Whistleblower Complaint Against Emil Bove
After Senate Republicans confirmed top DOJ official Emil Bove for a lifetime judicial appointment this week, it came to light that the DOJ’s inspector general failed to act on a whistleblower complaint, filed against Bove in early May. Libby Liu, the chief executive of Whistleblower Aid, which represents the whistleblower, told the New York Times she was “stunned,” adding, “Clearly the inspector general failed in their basic function here. If they don’t even open whistle-blower complaints, then what is going on?”
Homeland Security Heresies
Brian Kaylor, an expert on Christian nationalism and an ordained minister, has an excellent post on the Department of Homeland Security’s manipulation of Bible verses in social media posts to glorify its militarized, terrorizing crackdowns on immigrants. One grotesque video shows gun-toting agents in tactical gear storming buildings in nighttime raids. It is accompanied by the King James translation of Proverbs 28:1: “The wicked flee when no man pursueth; but the righteous are bold as a lion.”
Your Questions About the Texas Gerrymandering Scheme, Answered
From the indispensable elections news site Bolts, a reader Q & A with Brennan Center legal counsel Michael Li, about Texas Republicans following Trump’s orders to gerrymander congressional districts to enhance the GOP’s chances of holding the U.S. House of Representatives in the 2026 midterms. It’s extremely informative.
Appeals Court Skeptical of Trump Tariff Arguments
The full 11-member panel of the Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit “took turns questioning a top US Justice Department official about Trump’s argument that the nation’s persistent trade deficit qualified as a national emergency under the law, allowing the president to bypass Congress and hit countries across the globe with tariffs,” Bloomberg reports. A decision is expected in weeks, with an appeal to the Supreme Court likely. Meanwhile, Trump went ahead with announcements that he will impose massive tariffs on dozens of countries around the world come August 7, triggering a global stock slump.
Trump Family Corruption Watch
Eric Trump’s holdings in a Bitcoin mining venture formed in March could be worth $367 million in an anticipated initial public offering.
MAGA Podcasts Can’t Stop Talking About the Epstein Files
An analysis by the Wall Street Journal found that right-wing podcasters discussed Jeffrey Epstein in over 3,000 episodes of 125 podcasts this year, and that these discussions “grew more than eightfold in the last three weeks despite Trump’s admonishment that MAGA drop the issue.”
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