Elon Musk’s Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) has just blown the lid off one of Washington’s worst-kept secrets—the federal government has “misplaced” a jaw-dropping $4.7 trillion in taxpayer money. That’s trillion with a T, folks. Thanks to some conveniently “optional” tracking codes, massive sums of cash have been funneled into the abyss with no explanation and, conveniently, no accountability.
According to DOGE, the tracking codes—known as Treasury Access Symbols (TAS)—are supposed to connect payments to specific budget line items. The problem? The government often just didn’t bother filling them out. In other words, Washington bureaucrats had the option to track spending but simply chose not to. DOGE revealed that this loophole was routinely exploited, making it nearly impossible to figure out where these trillions actually went. Fortunately, the TAS field has now been made mandatory, but the damage has already been done—trillions have disappeared into the D.C. void, never to be seen again.
Now, less than a month into Donald Trump’s return to the presidency, DOGE is exposing just how recklessly Washington has been burning through taxpayer money—and the receipts are downright infuriating. Some of the more “essential” spending projects uncovered include $10 million for voluntary male circumcision in Mozambique, $32 million to prop up leftist activism in Prague, $40 million for yet another “gender equality” bureaucracy, $486 million for a shady elections and political process consortium, and $14 million to promote “social cohesion” in Mali. Because obviously, nothing says fiscal responsibility like prioritizing genital surgeries in Africa while Americans struggle under crushing inflation.
And if that weren’t enough, DOGE’s deep dive into government records has also uncovered staggering levels of fraud and incompetence. At least $2.7 trillion in improper or flat-out unauthorized payments were discovered, along with over $700 billion that simply vanished due to inaccurate record-keeping. Even worse, DOGE found that Medicare and Medicaid have been sending trillions in payments overseas—to people who weren’t even eligible to receive them. As if that weren’t cartoonish enough, Musk also revealed that more than 25 million supposedly “living” Americans—aged between 100 and 369 years old—are still collecting Social Security checks. Either we have a serious vampire problem, or the government is knowingly paying benefits to dead people. Musk himself couldn’t resist the sarcasm, quipping on X: “Maybe Twilight is real, and there are a lot of vampires collecting Social Security.”
Faced with this colossal fiscal disaster, Musk has sounded the alarm—warning that America is careening toward bankruptcy thanks to extreme government spending. The numbers paint a grim picture: the national debt’s interest payments have doubled in just four years, reaching $1.17 trillion under Biden, while the budget deficit ballooned to a staggering $1.8 trillion in 2024. Meanwhile, government debt itself skyrocketed by $2.3 trillion, hitting $35.7 trillion between 2023 and 2024. Yet, somehow, Washington still expects Americans to believe that their tax dollars are being wisely managed.
The numbers don’t lie, but Washington certainly does. The sheer level of corruption, fraud, and reckless spending uncovered by DOGE should have every American furious. And now, as Trump and Musk continue pulling back the curtain on D.C.’s disastrous bookkeeping, one question remains: will anyone in the deep state actually be held accountable, or will the political class just keep pretending this is business as usual?
The Treasury Access Symbol (TAS) is an identification code linking a Treasury payment to a budget line item (standard financial process).
— Department of Government Efficiency (@DOGE) February 17, 2025
In the Federal Government, the TAS field was optional for ~$4.7 Trillion in payments and was often left blank, making traceability almost…
