In Washington a year after Trump administration initiatives under the Department of Government Efficiency, or DOGE, triggered layoffs and disruptions across the federal government, former employees who were cut loose said the central question remains unanswered: what, if anything, the changes actually saved.
Thea Price, a former program operations manager at the U.S. Institute of Peace, told The Associated Press she had expected changes under the second Trump administration but not what she described as a wipeout. Price said she and other workers were not prepared for what she called the “complete destruction,” adding, “And for what?” She described a sequence in which USIP employees were fired, rehired, and then fired again as the administration pursued what it described as shrinking government.
DOGE, led in the initiative’s early stage by then-Trump adviser Elon Musk, said its mission was to root out fraud, waste and abuse in federal agencies. In the USIP case, the disruption became visible to workers when DOGE staffers entered the institute’s building early last year and set off a battle over who controls the organization, according to AP’s account. The disruption intensified later, when Trump placed his name on USIP’s Washington headquarters.
AP reported that USIP workers were hit on March 28, 2025, when they were fired—an action that later faced repeated reversals in court. A judge reversed the firing decision and reinstated workers with backpay, AP said, but an appeals court later stayed that ruling and the staff was fired again for a second time. The case continued amid further uncertainty as the matter moved through the courts and as another personnel-related dispute awaited a U.S. Supreme Court decision that could affect how far the president’s control extends over agencies that have been treated as independent.
White House spokesperson Davis Ingle, when asked by AP how much DOGE had saved, said “President Trump was given a clear mandate to eliminate waste, fraud and abuse from the federal government,” and said the administration had made “significant progress” in making the federal government more efficient to serve the American taxpayer. The DOGE website, in turn, said it had saved about $215 billion through job cuts, contract and lease cancellations, asset sales and grant rescissions. Musk’s stated target was $2 trillion in savings.
But AP reported that outside entities—including the Government Accountability Office, a congressional watchdog of spending—have not been able to pinpoint how much was saved or lost. It also reported that many challenges exist to the administration’s numbers. Cato Institute budget analyst Dominik Lett said he believed the DOGE tracking data had “basic mistakes,” leading him to conclude the figures were too high, and he said Cato and other organizations have avoided trying to compute a single figure because the relevant changes are complex. Lett also said a key unresolved question is how terminations occur and who gets fired, and whether lawsuits follow.
AP’s report also included estimates of a more constrained savings range based on rehiring decisions. Brookings Institution senior fellow Elaine Kamarck, analyzing media reports and public sources, said her review found about 25,000 people who were fired were later rehired because they were deemed essential. Kamarck said that could put potential savings between $100 billion and $200 billion, while emphasizing that final figures remain highly uncertain. The report also cited a GAO analysis that, in the Education Department’s civil rights division, layoffs may have cost $38 million, with employees paid months after termination.
For workers at USIP, the consequences have been immediate and personal, AP said, even as legal proceedings continued. USIP’s mission, established by Congress during the Reagan administration to promote peace and prevent global conflict, was reflected in how employees viewed what they had lost, including disruptions that followed DOGE activity that also dismantled parts of other organizations, according to AP. Price returned to work on maternity leave shortly before being fired on March 28, 2025, and later said her family had to rely on public assistance after SNAP approvals and a government shutdown disrupted payments.
AP also reported ongoing fallout as the initiative evolved from its initial visible phase. It said some high-ranking DOGE officials were later hired as permanent staffers in agencies including the Treasury Department, while former workers continued to look for jobs amid a labor market saturated with skilled applicants. Liz Callihan, who previously worked in communications at USIP, told AP she had applied for 140 jobs since being fired, and she questioned what the changes were for—describing the institute as having a “noble mission” and a relatively small annual budget of $50 million.
Across the broader federal changes, AP said the impacts are now the subject of sustained litigation. It reported that more than a dozen lawsuits have been filed challenging DOGE actions over the past year, including cancellation of grants, mass firings and buyouts, lawsuits over access to sensitive U.S. Treasury data and payment systems, and challenges to the closure of large federally funded programs.
Even as the original DOGE initiative receded from public view, AP reported that for people affected by the cuts, court dates and potential reversals have kept the sense of whiplash alive—especially in cases like USIP where reinstatement and firings have occurred in sequence, and where further outcomes may depend on decisions that could reshape how the executive branch can control agencies previously viewed as independent.