Rep. Majorie Taylor Greene, who is set to head a new House subcommittee on government efficiency, said on Sunday that “sanctuary” cities and states that provide safe havens for illegal immigrants by refusing to cooperate with federal immigration authorities should have to justify continuing to receive federal tax dollars.
The Georgia Republican, recently appointed to lead a subcommittee collaborating with the Elon Musk and Vivek Ramaswamy-led Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE), outlined her plans to reduce government spending during an appearance on Fox News’s “Sunday Morning Futures” with host Maria Bartiromo.
Greene said one area she wants to focus on is the Biden-Harris-inspired border and drug-smuggling crisis.
“I’d like to talk to the governors of sanctuary states and the mayors of sanctuary cities and have them come before our committee and explain why they deserve federal dollars if they’re going to harbor illegal criminal aliens in their states and their cities,” she said.
Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene highlighted the tragic case of Laken Riley, a 22-year-old nursing student who was brutally murdered while jogging on the University of Georgia campus in Athens in February. Jose Ibarra, a Venezuelan illegal immigrant, was convicted of her murder. Ibarra had been granted a “humanitarian flight” from New York City to Atlanta in September 2023.
Greene outlined several additional areas that may face cuts under the subcommittee’s plan to reduce government spending.
“The way to do that is to cut programs, contracts, employees, grant programs, you name it, that are failing the American people and not serving the American people’s interests,” Greene said, according to Fox.
The congresswoman stated that government-funded media programs like NPR, which she claimed “spread nothing but Democrat propaganda,” will be examined closely by the subcommittee. She also stated that it will explore current government contracts and programs to determine if they still “make sense” or if “their purpose has expired.”
Greene pointed to government employees who have continued working remotely since the COVID-19 pandemic, which prompted widespread remote work across both the public and private sectors.
“We’re also looking at many – we have thousands – of buildings that the federal government owns and pays for with over $15 billion a year, but yet those government buildings stood empty and these government employees stay at home,” she told Bartiromo.
She said these were “failures” in the federal government’s service to the American taxpayer.
“And we don’t care about people’s feelings,” Green added. “We’re going to be searching for the facts and we’re going to be verifying if this is worth spending the… American people’s hard-earned tax dollars on.”
After trouncing Vice President Kamala Harris, President-elect Trump announced in a statement that Musk and Ramaswamy would jointly lead the newly re-established Department of Government Efficiency or DOGE. Both Ramaswamy and Musk were vocal throughout Trump’s campaign about the need to reduce the size and power of the federal government.
“I am pleased to announce that the Great Elon Musk, working in conjunction with American Patriot Vivek Ramaswamy, will lead the Department of Government Efficiency [DOGE],” Trump wrote on his Truth Social platform.
‘DOGE’ is also a cryptocurrency that Musk has often promoted.
“Together, these two wonderful Americans will pave the way for my Administration to dismantle Government Bureaucracy, slash excess regulations, cut wasteful expenditures, and restructure Federal Agencies,” Trump said in a statement.
Trump said DOGE will “provide advice and guidance from outside of government” and “partner” with the White House and Office of Management and Budget to drive structural government reform, ABC News reported.
“‘This will send shockwaves through the system, and anyone involved in Government waste, which is a lot of people!’ stated Mr. Musk,” the statement continued.
