Niamh Shackleton
A tech expert with supposed ties to the Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) has revealed the staggering amount of cash she thinks is being wasted each year.
DOGE is headed by Elon Musk and was founded by the Trump administration when Donald Trump returned to office last month.
As the head of the newly-created department, Musk has been tasked with drastically slashing federal spending.
In the few weeks it has been up and running, DOGE claims to have saved $65 billion (as of February 24).
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It's believed that the agency wants to make a whopping $1 trillion in savings.
The sum comes from 'a combination of fraud detection/deletion, contract/lease cancellations, contract/lease renegotiations, asset sales, grant cancellations, workforce reductions, programmatic changes, and regulatory savings', its website states.
While this figure suggests that $65 billion worth of taxpayer money was being wasted, a tech expert has claimed the real number could be as much as $100 billion.
The woman, whose identity has not been revealed, goes by 'DataRepublican' on social media and has continuous interactions with Musk on Twitter.
She recently sat down with NewsNation to speak about the money supposedly being wasted.
When asked about the alleged amount of 'wasted' or potentially 'stolen' federal money and an estimated figure, she told journalist Brian Entin: "If I had to guess, I would say it is over $100 billion. But what is more important is what they are doing with that money."
The data scientist went on: "The numbers don’t lie. And look, they don’t always say what I want to hear. But they do tell me the truth."
Going on to discuss her alleged ties to DOGE and Musk, 'DataRepublican' explained that she does not 'communicate directly with Elon', but the Tesla CEO 'supports [her] work'.
"I have communicated with some people who are involved with DOGE," she continued to share. "And I don’t want to say much more than that, but I have a working relationship."
Musk is said to have encouraged people to follow 'DataRepublican' on Twitter, where she currently boasts over 400,000 followers.
As to how Musk found her online, the woman remains unsure.
"Honestly, I don’t know, you’d have to ask him," she said when asked.
While she doesn't know how he came to find out about her work, she's 'grateful' that he did.