Federal employees should either work in their offices or be fired, the co-heads of President-elect Donald Trump’s new Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) say – and a strong majority of voters agree.
DOGE Co-heads Elon Musk and Vivek Ramaswamy laid out their plans to eliminate government inefficiency and wasteful spending last week in a Wall Street Journal commentary. One of their proposals is to get rid government employees who insist on working from home, where they have less accountability.
The work-at-workplace requirement wouldn’t just improve accountability, it would also end up saving taxpayers money, they note:
“Requiring federal employees to come to the office five days a week would result in a wave of voluntary terminations that we welcome: If federal employees don’t want to show up, American taxpayers shouldn’t pay them for the Covid-era privilege of staying home.”
Americans largely support the proposal, results of a survey of general election voters conducted two days after Election Day for Tea Party Patriots Action by pollster John McLaughlin reveal:
- 65% say they support the proposal.
- 37% say they “strongly” support it.
- 29% say they “somewhat” support it.
- 12% “somewhat” oppose it
- 12% “strongly” oppose it.
The strength of support varied by party affiliation, ranging from three-fourths of Republican voters and two-thirds of Independents to a little more than half of Democrats.
Voters voiced even stronger support for the general concept of creating DOGE, when McLaughlin asked the following question:
“Do you support or oppose a department of government efficiency whose sole purpose is to audit the government for inefficiencies and to instruct Congress on adjusting the federal budget to reduce costs and eliminate redundancy, unnecessary programs, and unnecessary services?”
While Republicans’ and Independents’ support for creating a department dedicated to government efficiency roughly matched their backing of a work-at-workplace requirement, Democrat voter support was higher:
- 71% support the idea.
- 40% “strongly” support it.
- 31% “somewhat” support it.
- 10% “somewhat” oppose it
- 6% “strongly” oppose it.
- 79% Republicans support it.
- 68% of Independents support it.
- 64% of Democrats support it.
Nullifying Biden Administration executive orders designed to create de-facto law by bypassing Congress is key to their mission, Musk and Ramaswamy explain in their Wall Street Journal commentary.
The elimination of regulations will also justify reducing the number of employees on the federal government’s payroll, they note:
“The number of federal employees to cut should be at least proportionate to the number of federal regulations that are nullified: Not only are fewer employees required to enforce fewer regulations, but the agency would produce fewer regulations once its scope of authority is properly limited.”
Ironically, their department’s top goal is to be so successful that it can be eliminated, they say:
“Our top goal for DOGE is to eliminate the need for its existence by July 4, 2026—the expiration date we have set for our project. There is no better birthday gift to our nation on its 250th anniversary than to deliver a federal government that would make our Founders proud.”