Trump’s Quick Fix For Administrative Reforms

Trump said he wanted to return education back to the states, derided the department as wasteful and polluted by liberal ideology and in a strong comment declared that the experiment of controlling American education through federal programmes and dollars has failed our children, our teachers and our families

US President Donald Trump has in his second term, made reforms in federal governance a key component of his MAGA drive. He has established a new department- the Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE)- under his closest confidant Elon Musk and given him a free hand in downsising the various wings of the federal government.

The President is validating decisions of Musk by issuing Executive Orders on a running basis. DOGE has evidently discovered systemic corruption on a large scale and found legitimate grounds for enforcing cost-effectiveness.

Efficiency, by definition, is a measure of output per unit of resource- money and manpower in this case- and it is enhanced if the number of employees doing a job is reduced to the optimal minimum and likewise, if procedures are pruned to ensure that a task was completed in the minimal number of operational steps.

India has had a history of Administrative Reforms Commissions (ARCs) producing voluminous reports that only added to the size of bureaucracy and left behind no lasting impressions. It is interesting to note that Prime Minister Modi’s call for ‘minimum government maximum governance’ for India is what seemingly was being implemented by DOGE in America.

However, it is the large-scale lay-offs ordered at one go and the quick-fix style of working of the new department under Elon Musk, that has created a stir leading to many orders being challenged in the District Courts. The Trump Administration was not deterred by any of this- it seemed to be confident about pushing the judicial process through the Court of Appeals and even the Supreme Court.

Education and Health are the two basic concerns of the national government in a democratic dispensation for they laid the foundation for producing the right kind of electorate - apart from meeting the obligation of ‘welfarism’ that had to be discharged by a democratic state.

These two wings of the government are interestingly, the first among the segments targeted by DOGE for downsising through lay-offs.

Trump signed an executive order dismantling the Department of Education on March 20 but even before that on March 12 nearly 50 per cent of the department’s workforce had been laid off.

Trump said he wanted to ‘return education back to the states’, derided the department as ‘wasteful and polluted by liberal ideology’ and in a strong comment declared that ‘the experiment of controlling American education through federal programmes and dollars has failed our children, our teachers and our families’.

Federal actions have already been initiated against Ivy League schools, Columbia and Harvard, over alleged harassment of Jewish students. The Trump Administration has suspended several dozen federally funded research grants to Princeton University as part of its investigation into campus anti-Semitic activity.

Unsurprisingly, Civil Rights groups saw all of this as a policy going against principles of equality and equability and warned of the return of civil rights violations in schools. Established in 1979 the Department of Education oversees funding for public schools, monitors student loans and runs programmes that help low-income group students.

All this suggests that a comprehensively thought-out plan of reducing the size of the federal government was in play in which ideological intolerance of the advocacy of ‘liberalism’ considered not in alignment with America First, was discernible.

H1B visas that attracted bright students to America have become uncertain, denial of citizenship by birth has impeded the prospect of long-term settlement in the US of individuals who were willing to give their best there and the perceived discrimination in the policy towards outsiders, have all produced a certain degree of uncertainty and unpredictability in that country.

Sweeping changes in the federal research policy and funding have reportedly led to many US-based scientists contemplating shifting to Europe or Canada.

Post-doctoral and PhD students are also likely to decline in number for the same reason. It can be said, however, that unbridled freedom to run down a democratic regime through ‘narrative building’ or to take to the path of narcotics trade or human trafficking as a freedom of avocation, had to be put under a centralised check.

Trump's domestic and international policies have been implemented simultaneously, but it is important to consider whether, if given time to develop, they would restore stability for legitimate immigrants.

In great enthusiasm for implementing coordinated decisions quickly, the team of top Trump advisors apparently slipped up on the security front while using the encrypted Signal platform for a group chat relating to the plans of missile and drone launches against Houthis of Yemen.

Houthis had been attacking the ships carrying Western aid for Israel through the Red Sea.

The Editor of The Atlantic, Jeffrey Goldberg, who is virulently opposed to Trump got access to the chat in advance of the discussion on the plans to attack Houthis. National Security Advisor Mike Waltz owned responsibility for the leak -said to have been caused by a technical glitch -and President Trump responded by saying that a lesson had been learnt and that the Administration would move away from the messaging platform.

‘War plans with timelines’ cannot be discussed online- nothing is more important than this to warrant top advisors finding time to meet across the table in a confidential environment and comply with the ‘need to know’ principle. Speedy decision-making may require sacrifice of convenience but it can never be at the cost of security.

No policy maker is above briefing for security orientation and the norms of this would ideally be set by the Director of National Intelligence in the US context.

India has done well to approach the Trump Administration with an understanding of the latter’s security and economic concerns and work for maintaining strategic friendship between the two democracies.

Trump has a certain potential for handling the world’s trouble spots in a manner that checks escalation and gives a push towards resolution.

In opposing ‘Islamic terrorism’ and countering an aggressive China, India and the US remain on the same side of the fence regarding and trade & tariffs as well as immigration, India’s response of reason might help to sort out the issues and keep Indo-US relations smooth.

In the final analysis India as a major power having a say in the global issues of peace and economic development has the locus standi to sustain bilateral relationship with the Trump Presidency in a spirit of upholding the national interests of both the countries.