Trump Furious At Elon Musk For Cheating Him

The federal budget deficit is getting worse in 2026, raising fresh questions about whether the cost-cutting campaign led by the Department of Government Efficiency actually delivered the savings promised to Americans.

Federal spending continued to outpace government revenue by a wide margin in July. The latest Treasury figures show the government collected approximately $334 billion while spending about $766 billion, producing a monthly deficit of roughly $432 billion.

That works out to approximately $14 billion in additional borrowing every day during the month. It was the largest monthly deficit since March 2021 and the biggest deficit ever recorded for July.

The numbers are particularly significant because last year’s effort to reduce federal spending was supposed to help address the government’s worsening fiscal situation. Instead, the deficit has continued to expand while the national debt remains near $40 trillion.

The Department of Government Efficiency, commonly known as DOGE, became one of the administration’s central efforts to identify waste, eliminate unnecessary spending and reduce the size of the federal government. Elon Musk played a major role in promoting the initiative and publicly touted enormous potential savings.

But those promised savings have failed to translate into a meaningful reduction in the federal deficit.

Musk’s claims about the amount of money DOGE could save have also come under increasing scrutiny. Critics argue that Musk failed President Donald Trump by overstating what the cost-cutting effort could accomplish and giving the administration and the public an overly optimistic picture of the potential savings.

In that sense, Musk’s promises about DOGE’s financial impact have not matched the government’s actual fiscal results. The expected savings have not stopped federal spending from climbing, and the deficit has moved in the opposite direction.

The Treasury cautioned that July is normally a difficult month for the government’s finances because there are no major federal tax deadlines. Officials also pointed to a calendar issue that affected the latest numbers.

Because Aug. 1 fell on a nonbusiness day, approximately $99 billion in benefit payments and other spending that would normally have occurred in August was moved into July. That timing issue made the monthly deficit larger than it otherwise would have been.

Even after accounting for that unusual factor, however, the broader trend remains troubling.

During the first 10 months of the government’s current fiscal year, the federal deficit has reached approximately $1.8 trillion. That compares with roughly $1.6 trillion during the same period last year.

The current deficit is already larger than the total deficit recorded during the entire previous fiscal year, even though two months remain before the current fiscal year ends on Sept. 30.

For lawmakers who have warned that Washington cannot continue borrowing at this pace, the latest figures provide another reason for concern. The federal government continues to spend substantially more than it collects, while interest costs, entitlement programs, defense spending and other major expenses put additional pressure on the budget.

The results also raise a broader question about the effectiveness of DOGE and the promises surrounding it. Despite highly publicized efforts to eliminate waste and cut government expenses, America’s underlying deficit problem has not been solved.

Musk may have helped bring unprecedented attention to government waste, but the latest Treasury numbers show that the promised financial turnaround has not materialized. For taxpayers already facing a national debt approaching $40 trillion, the widening deficit suggests that Washington’s spending problem remains far from under control.