House Oversight and Accountability Committee Chairman James Comer, R-Ky., announced that his panel will hold a hearing next week focused on examining how government grew to become so massive and to explore reform measures as President Donald Trump seeks to reduce the bureaucracy’s size and spending.
Comer said the committee will consider the example of the Iowa state government, which was dramatically streamlined under legislation initiated by Republican Gov. Kim Reynolds.
“Hardworking taxpayers across the country expect their government to work efficiently and effectively, but the federal bureaucracy has ballooned to an unmanageable size,” Comer said in a press release on Wednesday.
“Many federal programs funded by Congress are now bloated, struggle to meet their objectives, and have become vulnerable to waste, fraud, abuse, and mismanagement. It’s clear that a complete overhaul of the federal government’s operations is long overdue.”
The chairman said he titled the Wednesday meeting “Rightsizing Government.” Reynolds and Thomas A. Schatz, president of Citizens Against Government Waste, are scheduled to testify.
Trump named Elon Musk and Vivek Ramaswamy to head an advisory Department of Government Efficiency, which has been tasked with finding ways to streamline and reduce spending. Ramaswamy recently left the endeavor to run for governor of Ohio.
Soon after Trump announced DOGE, the House Oversight Committee announced it planned to create a subcommittee for the advisory group. The subcommittee is to be chaired by Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene, R-Ga., and will work with Musk to aid the Tesla and SpaceX CEO’s goal of weeding out government inefficiency and wasteful spending.
“The House Oversight Committee has jurisdiction over executive branch reorganization and is well positioned to work with President Trump’s Department of Government Efficiency to reevaluate the scope and structure of the massive federal bureaucracy,” Comer said.
“The Committee is determined to facilitate government reforms that safeguard taxpayer funds while making the federal government more efficient and effective for all Americans.”
Reynolds’ Iowa reorganization cut the number of state Cabinet positions from 37 to 16 and has given the governor more hiring and firing flexibility, The Washington Times reported.
“Iowa has transformed the way our state interacts with citizens by shrinking and aligning government, saving taxpayers over $217 million in just 18 months,” Reynolds told the Times.
“It’s an honor to share this story in front of the House Oversight Committee, and I’m hopeful it can serve as a model for the Trump administration’s DOGE efforts.”
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