Draining the Swamp & TDS Effects – Top 3 Takeaways July 17th, 2025
Takeaway #1: Draining the swamp
Walk your way mentally back to 2016. When you heard Trump talking about draining the swamp, what came to mind? Often something that arrived at the conversational level of swamp creatures, correct? But who were the swamp creatures? Yeah, there were Obama administration officials that came to mind. But the idea was to “drain the swamp”, right? It wasn’t to replace the swamp creatures with theoretically less swampy creatures. Draining the swamp always meant a dramatic reduction in the size of the federal government itself. That can be defined in multiple ways. For some it’s all about spending. For others it’s about the size of the bureaucracy itself. In that vein we’re seeing the most meaningful draining of the swamp we’ve ever seen this week. Yesterday I spoke of the impact that Monday’s Supreme Court ruling pertaining to the Department of Education’s RIFs had across multiple departments. Today I can provide you with an idea of the immediate impact the ruling had. Prior to Monday, due to the many lawsuits that had been filed by left wing groups seeking to prevent the Trump administration from draining the swamp of its overflowing creatures, the size of the federal bureaucracy by way of the workforce was smaller, but only by 2.6% since January 20th. Since Monday’s ruling, that’s now bumped up to 11.9% and counting. And not only is that nearly a five-fold increase in swamp reduction this week, but it’s also going to equal massive ongoing cost savings. On a going forward basis, the average annual cost savings associated with an 11.9% reduction in the federal workforce stands at $33 billion per year! You know how the CBO scores things on a ten-year cost basis? What’s already happened this year represents an additional $330 billion in cost savings over the next ten years...and it’s far from being done. There’s still a hiring freeze in place meaning all non-essential federal vacancies aren’t to be replaced, and more government agencies will be rolling out their own plans to right-size their swampy organizations. Anyway, with the $9 billion – Rick Scott sponsored rescissions bill package making its way towards President Trump and this newly realized savings through a reduction in the federal workforce – we're now up to $339 billion in cost savings since the passage of the OBBBA.
Takeaway #2: Inside the swamp
Something else we learned on Wednesday was the extent of the swampiness in the State Department. According to the State Department, it took three months to even find out where people worked or how many people worked for the agency. How crazy is that? But wait, there’s more. Team Rubio uncovered over 700 domestic offices within the State Department with as many as 50 different layers of bureaucracy within that one department. By that meaning, that work completed within the State Department might have to be signed off on by as many as 50 different people based upon where the work was originated. Can you imagine effectively having 49 middle managers in your way to be productive in any way? The bottom line is that daily TPS reports would be more productive than what had been happening at State. Team Rubio also uncovered 60 different HR offices – 60! Each of which was paying employees. And what do you think the odds are that these issues were isolated to the State Department? I’m not sure what your vision of what took place day to day in the swamp looked like, but that’s been the reality you’ve been paying for. There’s no doubt so much more to do here and so much more to save as the swamp is drained.
Takeaway #3: The effects of TDS & The Rhetoric of the Left
On Tuesday, Miranda Perez, a 34-year-old woman from West Palm Beach became the fourth resident of Palm Beach County to be arrested so far this year for assassination threats against President Trump. In an online post Perez said: Hey Trump I'ma go to your Gulf [sic] course an be the next shooter lol I'm bored (emoji hands up and laughing emoji) be there soon. (smiling face emoji). This past Sunday marked one year since President Trump was shot. The second would-be assassin’s case last year has yet to take place and threats like Perez’s continue to roll in. TDS is real. This we know. Unfortunately, at least two of the threats have been real, and that’s also something we know. But here’s the thing that’s never covered and that should be. Here’s a quote for you. “Trump’s dangerous, reckless policies continue to threaten Social Security, Medicaid, and our democracy”. Do you know who said that one just recently? None other than the suspect’s representative Lois Frankel. Now, if one is already on the edge with TDS and your representative says that the president is “dangerous, reckless and a threat to democracy”, how might that translate? Could it possibly be that part of our problem with assassination threats locally could be related to the continued outrageous rhetoric of extremely irresponsible politicians? The local news media loved hearing what Lois had to say about Alligator Alcatraz recently. The news media loves being critical of Trump’s rhetoric. But why doesn’t anyone hold Lois or other politicians to account for their dangerous rhetoric? How many of a representative’s constituents needs to go to jail for threatening to kill the president of the United States before you realize that you’re part of the problem?