Congress Could Save Untold Billions If It Cuts Out The Budget ‘Gimmicks,’ Heritage Says

Congress could save billions by closing federal budget “loopholes” that have cost taxpayers more than $300 billion, a forthcoming report from the Heritage Foundation reveals.

The draft of the new report, first obtained by the Daily Caller News Foundation, highlights how spending recently enacted by Congress has been “nowhere near responsible.” Congress has also “increasingly abandoned” discretionary budgeting, according to the report.

“Americans work billions of hours every year, then send trillions of dollars in taxes to Washington,” David Ditch, a senior policy analyst at the Heritage Foundation, told the DCNF. “Taxpayers deserve to know how Congress uses their hard-earned money. Instead, big spenders in Congress use complicated gimmicks to play games with some of the budget while leaving the rest on autopilot. This report gives fiscally responsible legislators a roadmap for getting rid of gimmicks and returning to real budgeting.”

Legislators have used a growing variety of “obscure accounting maneuvers” in recent years to “create massive loopholes for discretionary spending” while also allowing mandatory spending to grow, according to the report. One of the so-called budget “loopholes” identified by the report is undisclosed changes, as not all information about the budgetary effects of provisions in appropriations legislation is made public. The report also suggests various broad reforms to congressional spending, such as Congress reducing its overall spending instead of increasing taxes.

“Washington has managed to shirk its duty to perform responsible budgeting for decades thanks to the trend of declining interest rates and low inflation,” according to the report. “Those times are gone. An enduring rise in the cost of financing the national debt coupled with large structural deficits and public concerns about the cost of living will make it increasingly difficult for officials to continue treating fiscal problems as an inconvenience. Finding a solution to this looming crisis is a leadership opportunity both for individual legislators and for Congress as a whole, which badly needs to earn back the confidence of the American public.”

Former President Joe Biden oversaw colossal government spending during his sole term, including signing his signature $1.9 trillion American Rescue Plan into law in March 2021. Government spending reached $1.79 trillion in fiscal year 2025. As of Thursday, the national debt and deficit reached $36.22 trillion and $711 billion, respectively.

President Donald Trump has pledged to wipe out unnecessary spending across the federal government. Just one week after returning to the Oval Office for his second term, the president temporarily froze federal grant spending, ordering federal agencies to “identify and review all Federal financial assistance programs and supporting activities consistent with the President’s policies and requirements.” Notably, a Biden-appointed federal judge issued an injunction against the spending freeze on Tuesday.

Many Republican lawmakers have criticized wasteful federal spending, including Republican Kentucky Sen. Rand Paul, who published a report in December highlighting over $1 trillion in government waste. House Republicans have reportedly been eyeing hefty spending cuts with price tags of trillions of dollars.

In November, Trump announced that he was nominating Vivek Ramaswamy and Elon Musk to co-lead a new Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) aiming to cut down on wasteful government spending. Musk is now the sole head of DOGE, as Ramaswamy confirmed on Jan. 20 that he was stepping down from the effort.