As the Department of Government Efficiency, OR DOGE, officially sunsets and federal hiring accelerates, with targeted surges at critical agencies and a push to insource work, the real story may be simpler than partisan theater: Sometimes you have to cut before you can right-size and the resulting criticism from Democrats and others didn’t change the underlying need for functional government operations.

Democrats in the modern era have been proponents of a large federal workforce they say is essential to delivering government services. They decried President Donald Trump’s DOGE cuts as reckless and harmful.

As recently as two weeks ago, as the program was in its final days, a Democratic nominee running this year for a congressional seat in West Virginia continued to campaign on the issue.

“We are here today because what happened last February was unjust then, and it is unjust now,” Ace Parsi, running in the state's 2nd Congressional District, said about the roughly 17-month DOGE effort. 

He spoke at Bureau of the Fiscal Service offices in the state and also said there is nothing wrong with wanting to make government more efficient, but he said that is not what DOGE did, according to the Associated Press. 

But now, as DOGE’s formal mandate expired on July 4, federal agencies are actively hiring again, after aggressive workforce reductions left many operations strained. 

The Trump administration’s efficiency drive, initially led by Elon Musk, significantly slimmed the federal workforce through buyouts, layoffs, and a hiring freeze, but created capacity crises across government. 

Agencies such as the Internal Revenue Service (IRS) (down 27%, now fast-tracking 8,000 hires); Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) (10,000 cut, targeting 12,000 new staff); Social Security Administration (SSA); National Endowment for the Humanities (NEH) (two-thirds lost), VA, Energy, and NASA are now posting record job openings on USAJobs – over 104,000 in early 2026 versus under 69,000 late last year– while launching specialized recruitment like Tech Force and encouraging insourcing of contractor work. 

Officials describe the shift as “reshaping” the workforce for administration priorities rather than endless cuts, with most agencies still operating far below pre-DOGE staffing levels.​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​

In February 2025, as Musk began leading DOGE, he defended the effort, calling it “common sense” and “not draconian or radical.”

“The people voted for major government reform, and that’s what the people are going to get,” he said at the White House. “That’s what democracy is all about.”

Sometimes you have to cut before you can right-size

DOGE’s aggressive reductions exposed and eliminated entrenched waste and overstaffing across federal agencies, creating short-term capacity challenges that are now being addressed through targeted hiring and insourcing. 

This reset has allowed the Trump administration to reshape the workforce around its America-first priorities rather than perpetuating bloat, delivering leaner, more efficient government operations.​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​

“We cut millions of people from the federal payroll," Trump said in January when announcing he eliminated nearly 300,000 employees from the federal payroll during his first year back in the White House.

"I don’t like doing that, but the good news is, I don’t feel badly because now they’re getting private sector jobs and they’re getting sometimes twice as much money, three times as much money. They’re getting factory jobs; they’re getting much better jobs and much higher pay.”

Ideal candidates for new hires

Rather than simply restoring old headcounts, officials are targeting specialized talent through programs like Tech Force, War Force, and NASA Force while encouraging insourcing of critical functions from contractors. 

The focused approach ensures, according to the administration, that the right people in the right roles can advance administration priorities, turning temporary cuts into a more efficient, mission-aligned federal workforce.​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​

The DOGE work Democrats criticized

DOGE delivered notable successes during its 18-month run under Trump. 

By incentivizing departures through the Fork in the Road program and enforcing targeted reductions, DOGE left the federal workforce significantly leaner – eliminating an estimated $215 billion in spending through job cuts, contract cancellations, grant rescissions, and asset sales. 

It addressed longstanding bloat, particularly in non-essential areas, while prompting a strategic shift toward insourcing critical work and launching recruitment drives like Tech Force to attract high-caliber talent in software, defense, and space. 

Agencies focused on core priorities such as immigration enforcement and Secret Service operations achieved net staffing gains, and the initiative forced a government-wide reevaluation that aligned headcount more closely with the administration’s goals — proving that bold efficiency measures can reshape a bloated bureaucracy without sacrificing essential functions.​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​

DOGE scored a major victory by dismantling the bloated U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID). The agency’s workforce was slashed from roughly 13,000 to under 900, 83% of its programs were canceled, and billions in contracts and grants were terminated, redirecting focus away from wasteful or misaligned foreign spending and saving taxpayers substantial sums while folding core functions into the State Department.