In an update issued on the July 4 public holiday, the Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) said it had saved taxpayers $804 million by canceling “54 wasteful contracts.”
These included one held by the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID) for a “director of the Armenia innovation hub” and another with the U.S. Agency for Global Media (USAGM) for “broadcast services to the Togolese Republic.”
Newsweek contacted the USAID and the USAGM for comment on Saturday via email outside of regular office hours.
Why It Matters
President Trump created DOGE following his second presidential inauguration in January, under the leadership of his then-close ally Elon Musk, which the task of cracking down on wasted government spending.
Musk left DOGE at the end of May and has since been sharply critical of Trump, including over his One Big Beautiful Bill increasing the U.S. debt ceiling. Friday’s update shows DOGE’s determination to maintain relevance after Musk’s departure.
What To Know
In a post on Friday, the official DOGE account on X, formerly Twitter, the Musk owned social-media platform, posted an update to its 4.9 million followers.
The post said: “July 4 Contracts Update!
“In the last 2 days, agencies terminated 54 wasteful contracts with a ceiling value of $1.8B and savings of $804M, including a $842k USAID professional services contract for a ‘director of the Armenia innovation hub within the USAID/Armenia Economic Growth Office’ and a $33k USAGM contract for ’24/7 FM broadcast services to the Togolese Republic.'”
🇺🇸July 4th Contracts Update!🇺🇸
In the last 2 days, agencies terminated 54 wasteful contracts with a ceiling value of $1.8B and savings of $804M, including a $842k USAID professional services contract for a “director of the Armenia innovation hub within the USAID/Armenia Economic… pic.twitter.com/kUBAwkyGDr
— Department of Government Efficiency (@DOGE) July 4, 2025
Details about the other 52 contracts that DOGE said it ended were not provided in the post.
DOGE has overseen efforts to fire federal government employees still on their probationary periods and to shut down the USAID, though both moves were challenged in court and the USAID continues to exist in skeleton form.
On Thursday, The Washington Post reported that federal officials were instructed to stop submitting spending proposals to a DOGE-controlled email address for review before they are announced.
In March, Trump said DOGE had saved “tens of billions of dollars” in “waste, fraud and abuse” though separate studies by The Washington Post and NPR put total cuts at around $2 billion.
What People Are Saying
Responding to the DOGE post on X, Matt Van Swol, a former Department of Energy employee with 270,000 followers, said: “Thank you so much DOGE team!!!!!
“Speaker Johnson thinks he and the House of Representatives deserve the ENTIRE week off next week while you guys are absolutely CRANKING saving us money!!!! Thank you for working so hard. I wish our elected leaders worked as hard for us too …”
Another X user, from New York, asked: “How do we know these were wasteful? Where is the monitoring and evaluation that shows that they were?”
What Happens Next
It remains to be seen how much influence DOGE will retain following Musk’s departure in May and subsequent falling out with Trump.
Further cuts will be required to reduce the U.S. deficit with the Congressional Budget Office projecting Trump’s One Big Beautiful Bill will add $2.4 trillion to the national debt.
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