On Wednesday, President Donald Trump said that his administration may consider returning to Americans 20% of the savings identified by Elon Musk’s Department of Government Efficiency initiative.
Trump, speaking at a meeting in Miami of global financiers and technology executives hosted by the Saudi Arabian sovereign wealth fund, said that he was also considering using an additional 20% of savings to pay off the federal government’s debt.
Musk had expressed an interest in the rebate concept earlier Wednesday and promised to “check with the President” about it.
James Fishback, Azoria’s CEO, and co-founder, suggested on social platform X that President Donald Trump and Musk should “announce a ‘DOGE dividend’ — a check for a tax refund sent to each taxpayer funded by a portion from the savings delivered by DOGE.”
Musk replied a little over two hours later, saying “Will check with the President.”
Fishback posted an image entitled “The Case for Doge Dividend” with his post.
Stating that DOGE aimed to save $2 trillion. Fishback suggested returning $400 billion in taxpayers’ money. This would be about $5,000 per household for the 78 million that pay federal income taxes.
Politico reported that such a rebate program requires congressional approval. Budget experts believe lawmakers may prefer to spend the money in another way.
Some House Republicans suggested that the savings could be used to reduce the national debt. Others see the DOGE savings as an opportunity to extend the Trump tax cut from his first term.
Democrats would undoubtedly be reluctant to support anything that could improve Trump’s popularity with voters.
The DOGE website stated that as of Wednesday morning, the “total estimated saving is $55 billion.”
The group says the amount represents “a combination of fraud detection/deletion, contract/lease cancellations, contract/lease renegotiations, asset sales, grant cancellations, workforce reductions, programmatic changes, and regulatory savings.”
