White House Denies Reports DOGE Doesn’t Exist Anymore, Says Agency Has No ‘Centralized Leadership’

The statement on DOGE came in response to a report claiming it doesn’t exist any longer.

The Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) website is displayed on a phone. Oleksii Pydsosonnii/The Epoch Times

The White House on Monday responded to reports that the Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) established under President Donald Trump was effectively ended, with the head of the White House’s human resources arm saying that it is not under centralized management.

A report from Reuters over the weekend included a quote from Office of Personnel Management Director Scott Kupor that DOGE “doesn’t exist” with eight months left to go before it is officially disbanded.

A White House official told The Epoch Times on Monday that DOGE has always been integrated throughout various federal agencies and that such efforts to reduce fraud, waste, and abuse will continue.

In a post on X on Sunday, Kupor disputed the Reuters headline that DOGE is nonexistent and suggested it was misleading. The article, he wrote, had crafty editing and “spliced my full comments across paragraphs” to “create a grabbing headline.”

“The truth is: DOGE may not have centralized leadership under [the United States Digital Service],” he stated. “But, the principles of DOGE remain alive and well: de-regulation; eliminating fraud, waste and abuse; re-shaping the federal workforce; making efficiency a first-class citizen; etc. DOGE catalyzed these changes” inside agencies along with the Office of Personnel Management and Office of Management and Budget, he said.

Kupor, in his post, also included a Nov. 21 OPM news release that stressed the federal government is focused on “maximum efficiency” in terms of hiring and firing staff.

DOGE was established by Trump earlier this year to reduce fraud, waste, and abuse in the federal government. The task force had included Tesla CEO Elon Musk as its leader before his departure from the administration in May after his special government employee status ended.

Shortly after Trump was elected, Musk said that the president had a mandate to “delete the mountain” of government regulations. Musk also made undoing government regulations and integrating AI two key parts of DOGE along with the mass termination of federal government positions.

Perhaps most notably, DOGE was involved in shutting down the U.S. Agency for International Development, or USAID, earlier this year. Secretary of State Marco Rubio, who was appointed acting administrator of USAID at one point, said in a post in August that the agency was being closed as he handed off leadership to OMB Director Russell Vought.

White House officials have maintained that the administration is committed to slashing what it views as fraudulent or wasteful programs.

A spokesperson for the White House, Liz Huston, told The Epoch Times in an emailed statement on Monday that “President Trump was given a clear mandate to reduce waste, fraud, and abuse across the federal government, and he continues to actively deliver on that commitment,” responding to a question about DOGE’s status and the Reuters report.

In the meantime, DOGE has continually posted updates on its X account and on its website about various projects. On Sunday, the task force said in a post that over the preceding nine days, it terminated dozens of “wasteful contracts” with a top value of $1.9 billion across different agencies.

The executive order that Trump signed earlier in the year said that DOGE would last through July 2026.