slash Government Waste
Government Funded Lobbying
Every year the government hands out as much as $160 billion in taxpayer grants to organizations, many of whom use taxpayer funds to lobby the government for more spending and regulations.
Legislation should be passed banning state and federal government grants or funding to organizations that spend any part of their budget on government lobbying.
Anonymous Earmarks
In 2009, Congress passed a massive omnibus spending bill containing over 9,000 earmarks costing nearly $8 billion, alongside thousands more in defense spending. Although the House banned earmarks in 2010, the ban was lifted in 2021 and passed another omnibus worth $8 billion again in 2022.
While President Trump has taken an aggressive stance against the earmark and omnibus spending patterns, Congress has not agreed to do so. In 2026, Congress passed a $1.2 trillion minibus spending bill that included over $15 billion in earmarks, effectively rejecting Trump’s efforts to cut down government waste.
Congress should maintain its ban on any and all anonymous earmarks, and oppose any efforts to sneak de facto earmarks into legislation.
Cost of Legislation
Frequently national and state lawmakers must vote for legislation with little information on the total costs. And the public is often completely in the dark until later.
Congress and the state legislature must be required to estimate the cost for all legislation and publicly make that information available prior to the vote.
Government Micromanagement
The bloated federal bureaucracy burdens taxpayers with a cost of $21 billion a year. But far more meddlesome and expensive are the federal mandates that micromanaging bureaucrats pile on businesses and state and local governments.
That the number of non-military federal employees should be cut by at least 21%, saving half a trillion dollars over ten years. And both federal and state government salaries and benefits that are found to be in excess of private sector compensation for the same or similar job should ultimately be reduced.
Wasteful Government Agency Regulation
Every year federal agencies issue some 70,000 pages of rules and regulations. Many are grossly outdated and inefficient. In 2020 government regulations cost the U.S. economy $1.9 trillion annually, and this number is increasing.
Federal regulations should automatically expire after eight years unless public hearings show they are still necessary and cost-effective. A sunset provision would help reduce unnecessary regulatory burdens and support economic growth.
In addition, before any agency can emit a new regulation, it should be required to offset the cost to the economy by repealing one or more existing regulations.
Lawyer Welfare
The Legal Services Corporation routinely uses federal funds to pursue partisan political cases and sue taxpayers for more social welfare spending.
Legislation should be passed to end taxpayer funding for lawyers and their political lawsuits by closing the Legal Services Corporation.
National Endowment for the Arts
The U.S. Constitution contains no permission for the federal government to fund any kind of art, yet the National Endowment for the Arts has doled out more than $4 billion dollars to fund “highly controversial” art projects. Thankfully, in 2025, President Trump cut many of these grants, but something more must be done.
Legislation should be passed to end federal funding for the National Endowment of the Arts, thereby ending forced taxpayer subsidies for superfluous art projects.
National Endowment for the Humanities
Many Americans have criticized the National Endowment for the Humanities for its superfluous spending. For instance, one of its largest grants was for a program to encourage citizens to get together and chat.
Donald Trump took steps in 2025 to cut back operations and DEI initiatives, but the job is not complete without fully shutting down the National Endowment for the Humanities.
Legislation should be passed to end federal funding for wasteful “humanities” projects by closing the National Endowment for the Humanities.
District of Columbia
Residents of the District of Columbia face high tax rates, while federal taxpayers also contribute hundreds of millions of dollars annually to support its government, which has been criticized for mismanagement and corruption.
Legislation should be passed to end taxpayer subsidies and bailouts for the local government expenses of the District of Columbia.
Price Fixing
U.S. consumers pay $2.5 billion to $3 billion per year for inflated sugar costs due to the federal government’s price fixing.
Legislation should be passed to end all price supports and quotas which raise the price Americans pay for sugar far above the market price.
Department of Education
While student performance has reached historical lows, the Department of Education's budget has ballooned to over $79 billion. Virtually none of this money ever makes it to a classroom but instead funds scores of federal education bureaucracies.
Legislation should be passed to end all federally funded education programs and return full control of education to the state and local levels.
