Staff Reports
Barack Obama may have thought the White House Correspondents Dinner was the perfect stage to mock Donald Trump, but it seems even the former president’s loyal aides have to tip their hats to the current guy once in a while. Despite an ongoing feud that could rival a heavyweight boxing match, Obama’s former speechwriters, Jon Favreau and Jon Lovett, have finally shown a flicker of respect for the administration they once likely viewed as a tornado tearing through their carefully constructed legacy.
Taking a break from bashing the current administration on the left-leaning podcast “Pod Save America,” Favreau and Lovett found themselves surprisingly impressed by President Trump’s latest brainchild, the Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE), led by none other than the entrepreneurial titan, Elon Musk. Both speechwriters conceded that the bold moves being made by DOGE were the kind of ideas they had only dreamt of back when they were under the Obama umbrella. One has to wonder if that realization left them feeling a tad sheepish, knowing that all their hard work had been eclipsed by the entrepreneurial zest of their high-profile successor.
WATCH: Fox’s @marcthiessen: “It was Barack Obama who founded DOGE, the U.S. DOGE service, which under Obama was the U.S. digital service that brought in tech bro’s – kids from Google – as presidential innovation fellows and deployed them in his words as ‘swat teams’ to the… pic.twitter.com/19mpKfo5P0
— TV News Now (@TVNewsNow) February 14, 2025
Lovett, during the podcast, lamented about missed opportunities, lamenting that they hadn’t realized the government machinery could actually operate with any sense of speed or efficiency. Oh, the irony of being workers in the White House and discovering that the government can, in fact, be trimmed of its inefficiencies. The duo admitted that they found it both “annoying” and enlightening to witness a tangible shake-up in a system they had previously branded as hopelessly bogged down in red tape. Yes, it’s the kind of moment when one feels anxiety over both one’s wasted potential and the realization that “slow government” might actually be a choice rather than an inevitability.
DOGE’s recent announcement that it would be cutting nearly $1 billion in funding, particularly honing in on diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) programs, was a sight to behold. With Trump’s administration making actual efforts to slash taxpayer money spent on increasingly absurd initiatives, it’s hard not to chuckle at the irony. Favreau and Lovett had to cringe as they acknowledged that even their lofty White House aspirations had not led to the pruning of such extravagances.
With 29 DEI grants—costing a hefty $101 million—being put out to pasture, including programs designed to “help teachers assist students in interrogating complex histories of oppression,” it’s hard not to roll one’s eyes. Meanwhile, Musk couldn’t resist poking fun at the waste. Mentioning the $1.5 million spent on a contractor who just observed mail operations? Just like that, DOGE became the humorous embodiment of government spending gone wrong.
So, while Favreau and Lovett may have once enjoyed a comfortable life under the Obama regime, they now find themselves begrudgingly impressed by the common-sense cuts being executed by a man they surely didn’t think would be able to bring any efficiency to the table. In a world where functional government might seem like a dream, this odd twist of admiration for Trump serves as a glorious reminder that competence can potentially shine through, even amidst previous disdain.
