How Could DOGE Help Protect Animals?

All eyes have been on President-elect Donald Trump as he publicly shapes his coming administration. Those of us who would like to see the size and scope of the government reduced have been tentatively optimistic about the creation of the Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE). Some animal welfare activists are asking an important question: Could DOGE help protect animals from the federal government? 

The math says yes. 

White Coat Waste Project, an organization dedicated to ending taxpayer-funded animal experimentation, has highlighted the many ways the federal government wastes money and exploits animals simultaneously. Here are just a couple of the suggestions they have for DOGE’s chopping block: 

1. Eliminate contributions to foreign nations for animal testing, like the millions we send to China every year for cruel animal experimentation for;

2. Cutting the millions in National Institutes of Health funding a South Carolina primate experimentation company receives (yes, the very one recently making headlines after 43 monkeys escaped); 

3. And ending the Department of Defense testing that spends millions to maim and shock cats in unethical and unnecessary experiments. 

“A growing majority of taxpayers—Republicans, Democrats, and Independents alike—oppose Uncle Sam’s wasteful, dangerous, and cruel animal experiments at home and abroad and they shouldn’t be forced to foot the bill,” stated Anthony Bellotti, White Coat Waste’s founder and president, in an email. “DOGE can save billions of tax dollars and millions of animals by cutting the F.A.T.: federal animal testing.” 

Taxpayer-funded animal experimentation burns through an estimated $20 billion every year. But the federal government doesn’t just support animal torture through paying for experimentation—taxpayer funding and bureaucracy prop up animal cruelty in other ways.

The Department of Agriculture’s Wildlife Services is one of the best examples of government-sponsored animal cruelty in action. Government websites would tell you otherwise, but in reality, the program’s sole function has been to kill wildlife, particularly predators. I recently highlighted Wildlife Services and provided the following examples from Montana: 

“In one harrowing example, federal employees killed 61 coyotes in under four hours on one trip in Montana. Wildlife Services also killed a whopping 6 percent of Montana’s wolf population in a three-year period.”

Wildlife Services receives hundreds of millions annually, making it a key target for DOGE to cut. Other places for consideration include agriculture subsidies, the Bureau of Land Management’s Wild Horse and Burro program, and the Agriculture Research Service (also run through the Department of Agriculture). 

It’s easy to find places to cut that would help save animals from the government. Still, an important question remains: Will DOGE even include government-sponsored animal cruelty on its priority list when it looks to cut funds? A recent comment from Vivek Ramaswamy, who will co-lead DOGE alongside Elon Musk, offers some hope for animal lovers. 

On November 4, Ramaswamy posted, “Animal cruelty will eventually become a genuine concern for conservatives. It’s already happening. Count me in.”

For the sake of animal welfare, let’s hope Ramaswamy remembers this announcement. The federal government has blatantly funded animal cruelty for far too long. DOGE may have the political will to do something about it.