WASHINGTON, DC – Just two days after President Donald Trump was sworn in as the 47th President of the United States, U.S. Sen. Joni Ernst (R-IA) appeared Wednesday afternoon before a luncheon meeting of The Ripon Society to discuss the effort she is leading on Capitol Hill to rein in excessive government spending and waste.
A longtime proponent of fiscal discipline who served as a county auditor before her election to the U.S. Senate, the Hawkeye state legislator recently launched the U.S. Senate Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) Caucus that will work in tandem with the U.S. House DOGE Caucus and the U.S. DOGE Service Temporary Organization that will be headed by Elon Musk in the second Trump Administration.
“Here we have a new era under President Trump,” stated Senator Ernst in her opening remarks. “We have a new opportunity with the Department of Government Efficiency, and I was really glad when President Trump grabbed a hold of this. I was able to sit down with Vivek Ramaswamy and Elon Musk prior to President Trump taking office. I met with them in November down at Mar-a-Lago and presented them with a blueprint of about $2 trillion of savings, which is exactly what Elon Musk had said they wanted to achieve in the Department of Government Efficiency.”
Ernst, who was first elected ten years ago, has been shining a light on government waste since her first day in office through her Make ‘Em Squeal Awards. But, her team doesn’t stop there, she shared.
“If you are working in the federal government and you cannot find waste anywhere, it just tells me you are not looking, because there is waste everywhere. My team and I then also look at ways that we can correct those deficiencies, the ways that we can combat the waste. We take a problem, and we propose a solution to it. … I have 10 years’ worth of legislation that is ready to go, and we are finally able to take it to a department now within our federal government and department.”
In addition to the monthly award program, she discovered that only six percent of the federal workforce is coming into the office every day of the week, a matter President Trump addressed in one of his many executive orders on his first day in office.
“We’re not going to keep doing the COVID model where you just don’t even show up a single day every week. That era is gone, folks. If we are going to have teleworkers, we’re going to make sure that there are standards in place. The American people expect better of our federal workforce, and I hope that they get it.”
“With the DOGE Caucus, what we have actually done is put Washington D.C. on notice. So, we’re going to ferret it out. If there’s waste out there, we’re going to find it. We’re going to propose changes and try to enact those changes.
“We’re touching every federal government agency, every action, every reaction. We have had several meetings already, as has the House, and we will be working then with the Administration and Elon Musk. We will be working hand in hand with him, and he has been very, very supportive of my efforts.”
In the Question & Answer portion of the discussion, Chair Ernst fielded a question regarding efforts to relocate some of the federal departments and agencies to areas of the country they serve the most.
“It doesn’t make sense to have all of these agencies focused here when they could do a better job if they have to go to the grocery store and face someone that’s actually dealing with an issue in their department. They think a little bit more about what they’re doing and the rules and regulations that they’re writing … They should be accountable to the people they’re supposed to work for.”
To view Senator Ernst’s remarks to The Ripon Society Wednesday afternoon, please click the link below:
