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Defense Sec. Pete Hegseth announced Thursday that the Department of Defense (DOD) would cut more than $580 million in contracts.
The contracts “do not match the priorities of this president and this department,” Hegseth said in the announcement on X. The cuts come from DOGE as it works its way through the Pentagon. “I commend Department leadership for identifying these opportunities to cut wasteful spending, and I encourage other leaders across the enterprise to follow this example and identify more opportunities for savings which we can re-invest in critical mission needs,” Hegseth said in a memo shared by the Daily Caller.
The cuts include programs like the Defense Civilian Human Resources Management System, which was only supposed to cost $36 million and last a single year. Instead, it went $280 million over budget and lasted eight years. Other cuts went on things like diversity, equity and inclusion programs, “equitable” AI, and similar-sound initiatives costing millions of dollars each.
“I need lethal machine learning models, not equitable machine learning models,” Hegseth explained.
Bye-Bye Consultants
Hegseth also waved goodbye to consulting services specifically for IT from Gartner and McKinsey, which came with a $30 million bill. Civilian workforces will also be cut by 5-8%, but some 21,000 employees have already taken the option of a voluntary Deferred Resignation Program, Daily Caller reported.
The Pentagon is required to pass a financial audit by 2028, having failed seven consecutive audits, including one in 2024. Some $170 million is now said to be reallocated to mission-critical priorities.
Not All Cuts Are Permanent
Roughly 1,000 employees of the National Parks Service who were previously “fired” as a result of DOGE cuts had their positions reinstated in March, according to the LA Times. The workers were all in probationary periods at the time of the cuts.
A further 25,000 federal workers have also had their positions reinstated after reviews conducted by DOGE, the BBC reported. As legal decisions over the cuts move their way through our nation’s courts, we’re asking for prayer for all those impacted by this upheaval. We are experiencing many changes in America right now, so much so that some may call this moment in history a revolution. That is why your voice is so important today.
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