NOTE: The Department of Defense Office of Inspector General has reached out to Cryptopolitan to clarify that the U.S. Marine Corps (USMC) and Defense Logistics Agency Transaction Fund (DLA TF) had an extended reporting deadline approved by the Office of Management and Budget (OMB). Both agencies published their Agency Financial Reports (AFR)—the USMC on February 3 and DLA TF on February 21—which included their auditor’s opinions. The DoD OIG AFR, along with its auditor’s opinion, was released on December 18. The agency clarified that components don’t “submit audits”—instead, they publish AFRs, which are official financial reports that outline the Department’s financial status and early performance results. These reports are meant to show accountability to Congress, the President, and the public, detailing how the Department manages its financial resources. Each AFR includes financial statements, explanatory notes, and auditor reports. While the provided links do not directly confirm the OMB extension, the DoD OIG told us they prove that these financial opinions were issued before the article was published and were not modified.
Not all of the entities inside the Pentagon managed to pass their audits last year. One got a “qualified” rating, meaning the books weren’t great but not a total disaster.
Pentagon spending raises questions
Sean Parnell, assistant to the secretary of Defense for public affairs, pointed to wasteful contracts in a video posted Monday night. According to him, the Department of Government Efficiency (led by Musk) has identified $80 million in potential savings, though this barely makes a dent in the Pentagon’s $850 billion budget.
Parnell called out $13 million in projects that had little to do with military operations. This included:
- $1.9 million for the Air Force’s “holistic DEI transformation and training”
- $6 million to the University of Montana to “strengthen American democracy by bridging divides”
- $3.5 million for “support to DEI groups” from the Defense Human Resources Activity
- $1.6 million to the University of Florida to study “social and institutional detriments of vulnerability and resilience to climate hazards in African Sahel”
“This stuff is just not a core function of our military,” Parnell said, calling these expenses “a distraction.”
Parnell claimed this is just the start. He said the DoD will keep cutting unnecessary spending and focusing on making the military more effective. Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth has already outlined plans to reduce military spending by 8% over the next five years.
Musk’s D.O.G.E charges agencies for its work
While Musk’s D.O.G.E is supposed to make the government more efficient, the group isn’t exactly doing it for free. The Office of Personnel Management (OPM) has been asked to pay over $4 million for work being done by the department between January 20 and July 4, 2026. A draft agreement obtained by CNN shows that OPM is required to fund 20 full-time positions at the highest federal pay scale.
According to the agreement, D.O.G.E would modernize OPM’s IT systems. The agency’s internal systems are outdated and incapable of handling current government operations. The agreement also requires OPM to give D.O.G.E full access to its data and systems.
Musk’s team insists this is about making the government run better and saving taxpayer money, but critics argue it’s just another way to fire federal workers and access sensitive government data. No one knows if other agencies have been asked to pay for D.O.G.E’s work.
The group operates in secrecy. It is housed inside the Office of Management and Budget (OMB), making it exempt from federal public records laws. The White House has also stated Musk is not the administrator of D.O.G.E, only an adviser to Trump, which gives him executive privilege protections.
Where is the money coming from?
The biggest question is how D.O.G.E is being funded. Previously, the agency was known as the United States Digital Services, but Trump renamed it on his first day in office through an executive order. Since then, it’s been a mystery where the money is coming from and how much the entire operation is costing taxpayers.
Musk has repeatedly said he’s a volunteer, and his staff’s pay structure remains unclear. “Some people are federal employees,” Musk told Fox News’ Sean Hannity.
“But it’s fair to say that the software engineers at D.O.G.E could be earning millions of dollars a year, and instead are earning a small fraction of that as federal employees.”
The draft agreement states that full-time employees would be paid at the highest level of 15 possible grades in the federal pay system.
This translates to $141,817 annually at the base rate, but salaries increase based on location. In Washington, D.C., the number jumps to $189,950. Over a 17.5-month period, 20 full-time salaries would cost at least $4.1 million.
A government employee at OPM told CNN, “Some people think they are working for free. No, we are paying. It’s like having a contract with an entity to perform services, except this is forced on us so we are forced to do an agreement to retain their services.”
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