VA Urged by DOGE to Cut 435 Programs Last Year Totaling $1.1 Billion: OIG

The Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) once led by trillionaire Elon Musk encouraged the Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) to scrap hundreds of contracts last year totaling approximately $1.1 billion, according to a new government watchdog report.

The VA Office of Inspector General (OIG) report issued Tuesday was described by the watchdog as a review of contracts “terminated for convenience,” or contracts that the government ended “because it was in its best interest.”

The OIG determined that VA terminated 435 contracts for convenience, valued at approximately $1.1 billion, out of 2,210 reviewed contracts. Requested by the aforementioned senators to specifically review the cancellation of contracts, the OIG found that the cancellation request process under review involved individual contract actions.

Analysis stemmed from a June 13, 2025, request made by Sens. Richard Blumenthal of Connecticut, the ranking member of the U.S. Senate Committee on Veterans’ Affairs, and committee member Senator Angus King of Maine.

Lawmakers’ Requests

The lawmakers asked the OIG to review the cancellation of VA contracts that began after Jan. 20, 2025, or after DOGE was instituted, to identify which contracts were canceled, reduced in scope, stopped, or allowed to expire as part of this cancellation effort.

“As defined in the FAR [Federal Acquisition Regulation], a contract may encompass multiple contract actions including delivery orders, task orders or purchase orders,” the report says. “This means that in some cases, parts of a contract (rather than an entire contract) were terminated.”

The remaining 1,775 contract actions the OIG reviewed were reinstated or never terminated for convenience, with the watchdog adding that may indicate that they were also being considered for termination before officials ultimately kept them.

The OIG also found errors in the data submitted to Congress in May and July 2025. In April 2026, VA submitted an updated list with improved clarity to Congress.

VA Responds, Says Cut Contracts ‘Wasteful’

Blumenthal and King, in their inquiry, cited concerns regarding the impact of the cancellations, the use of artificial intelligence and algorithms in decision-making, the input of VA career subject-matter experts, contingency plans to replace services provided from a canceled contract, and the financial transfer of funding from canceled contracts to other VA activities.

In response, the OIG team reviewed the process VA used to select contracts for termination along with the accuracy of the number of terminated contracts and their associated values reported by VA.

“The IG report simply confirms what we’ve said from the beginning: VA terminated hundreds of wasteful and duplicative contracts, saving the department more than $1 billion,” VA spokesperson Quinn Slaven told Military.com. “Thanks to the methodical and careful review process VA put in place, these contract cancellations had no negative impact whatsoever on VA care and benefits.

“Instead, the department is reinvesting these massive savings to make landmark improvements to VA care and benefits.”

Slaven added that “this is precisely the type of commonsense approach that has been missing from VA for decades,” praising President Donald Trump and Secretary Doug Collins.

The VA has the second-largest acquisition budget in the federal government, obligating $78.3 billion for contracts in Fiscal Year 2025, according to the OIG.

In an April 2026 statement provided to The Washington Post, Blumenthal said the following: “Today, the Department of Veterans Affairs is providing more care and more benefits to more veterans than ever before.”