The creation of a new “Delivery of Government Efficiency” committee by the Texas House of Representatives is unlikely to achieve much, according to experts on politics in the Lone Star State, with one describing the project to Newsweek as “partisan exhibitionism.”
Newsweek reached out to Texas DOGE House Committee chair Giovanni Capriglione via online inquiry form for comment on Tuesday.
Why It Matters
The federal Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) has already proven controversial. It has presided over substantial cuts to federal employment and reduced the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID) to a skeleton.
The Texas DOGE committee has a similar aim of eliminating government waste, though it’s not yet clear how successful it will be compared to its federal namesake.
What To Know
President Donald Trump established DOGE, led by tech billionaire Elon Musk, shortly after his inauguration in January. DOGE was created to slash what the Trump administration considers wasteful government spending. Musk previously suggested that the federal budget could be cut by up to $2 trillion.
Despite its name, DOGE isn’t a full government department, and its influence heavily depends on Trump’s support.
The Texas House DOGE committee, which is made up of eight Republican and five Democratic representatives, was created in a bid to replicate this at the state level. However, it only has the power to make recommendations to the executive.
Professor Calvin Jillson, an expert on Texas politics at the Dedman College of Humanities and Sciences, told Newsweek that the Texas DOGE committee would struggle to make substantive cuts.
“Establishing a mini-DOGE in Texas is mostly partisan exhibitionism because Texas state government is already very lean. Texas tax collection per capita are just 65 percent of the U.S. average. So, cut what?” Jillson said.
“Texas is among the most tightfisted states; not only did Texas decline to expand its Medicaid program as part of Obamacare, it has not raised its base per student funding rate for public schools since 2019. Inflation since 2019 has totaled percent.”
Joshua Blank, who heads the Texas Politics Project at the University of Texas at Austin, agreed, telling Newsweek: “Texas already maintains what we might refer to as a ‘low-taxes, low-services’ model of government, and after over 20 years of unfettered Republican rule, no one can credibly claim, especially the Republicans who have been in charge of that government, that it is riddled with waste, fraud and abuse.
“So while Texas may be following the president’s rhetorical lead, the effort here is already shaping up to look very different, with a significant forward-looking emphasis on future efficiencies and future rulemaking processes—not a major overhaul.”
Blank added that Texas “already has a robust and oft-used sunsetting process,” the Texas Sunset Advisory Commission established in 1977, and questioned what the new DOGE committee could achieve that the older body couldn’t.
Professor Jon Taylor, a Texas politics expert who teaches at the University of Texas at San Antonio, told Newsweek that the Lone Star State already has a minimalist government and that the DOGE committee’s remit would overlap with the Texas Sunset Advisory Commission.
“The Texas version of DOGE appears to be aimed at piggybacking on the Trump administration’s ever-increasingly unpopular approach to addressing perceived inefficiencies in the federal government,” Taylor said.
“If inefficiency or waste in Texas state government was a chronically urgent problem, I would note that Republicans have had plenty of opportunities to address this since they’ve held control of the governorship since 1994 and the Legislature since 2002…
“Additionally, Texas already has several levels of accountability in place within the state’s executive and legislative branches, from the governor to the comptroller to the state auditor to the Legislative Budget Board to the Texas Sunset Advisory Commission to various Texas Senate and House committees that have legislative oversight.
“Given these various entities’ roles in assessing state government effectiveness and efficiency, the Texas House DOGE Committee feels more like a PR exercise.”
What Happens Next
The Texas DOGE committee held its first meeting at the beginning of March, according to Austin news station KXAN. The meeting lasted 12 hours.
While the committee can make recommendations for policy change, it will require the support of the Republican-controlled Texas Legislature and Governor Greg Abbott. At this stage, it’s unclear to what extent this will be forthcoming.
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