WASHINGTON, March 4 (Reuters) - U.S. President Donald

Trump is expected to boast about his sweeping cuts to the

federal bureaucracy during an address to a joint session of

Congress on Tuesday night, with praise for tech billionaire Elon

Musk's so-called Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE).

Trump has given Musk and his DOGE team extraordinary power.

In just six weeks entire government agencies have been

dismantled and tens of thousands of workers fired. Critics,

including a growing number of U.S. lawmakers, have voiced

concerns about potential conflicts of interest between DOGE's

decisions and Musk's business interests as CEO of electric

vehicle maker Tesla, space contractor SpaceX and social

media platform X.

WHAT EXACTLY IS DOGE?

DOGE was created by an executive order Trump signed on his

first day in office on January 20 to "modernize federal

technology and software to maximize governmental efficiency and

productivity."

Despite its name, DOGE is not a government department

created by an act of Congress. It is a temporary organization

that took over an existing unit within the White House, the U.S.

Digital Service. It appears to be accountable only to Trump.

Its mandate now far exceeds confines of the language of the

initial executive order as its staffers sweep through government

departments looking for spending and staff cuts.

The team is small, about 40 people, many of them young

software engineers who are current and former employees in Musk

companies. They have little to no experience inside the U.S.

government.

Musk, the world's richest person, does not draw a government

salary and operates as a "special government employee," the

White House has said. It has been vague on Musk's exact role in

DOGE, although he is clearly overseeing the government overhaul.

Facing questions from judges over who exactly is in charge

of the cost-cutting unit, the White House named Amy Gleason, a

former healthcare executive, as acting administrator.

Musk has said his goal is to find $1 trillion in savings.

The federal budget is set to reach about $7 trillion this year.

HAS DOGE SAVED MONEY?

According to its website, the only official window into its

operations, DOGE says it had saved U.S. taxpayers $105 billion

as of March 2 through a series of actions, including workforce

reductions, asset sales, and contract cancellations.

Yet its savings total is unverifiable and its

calculations have been riddled with errors and corrections.

In the "receipts" section of its website, DOGE has

repeatedly deleted some of its biggest claims to taxpayer

savings. For instance, it reported one $8 billion contract that

turned out to be worth only $8 million.

Musk has said DOGE will correct mistakes when it finds

them.

WHAT HAS DOGE DONE?

Musk's team has taken a wrecking ball to parts of the

federal bureaucracy, hollowing out some agencies and sowing

panic among much of the 2.3 million-strong civilian government

workforce.

To date, DOGE members have entered about 20 government

agencies, gaining access to computer systems that contain

personal data of past and present federal workers and millions

more Americans.

Through the Office of Personnel Management (OPM), the U.S.

government's human resources arm, DOGE sent a buyout offer to

government workers last month. About 75,000 have accepted.

It has fired or sent termination notices to at least 25,000

other government employees, starting with probationary workers,

who have fewer legal protections. The next target is the bigger

pool of veteran career civil servants.

Last month Trump signed another executive order ordering

agency heads to work with DOGE to deliver plans by March 13 for

"large-scale reductions" in the federal workforce.

Unions have filed more than two dozen lawsuits challenging

mass firings and other Trump administration initiatives that

impact the federal workforce, with mixed results so far.

A group of unions won a February 20 order temporarily

blocking Musk's government downsizing team from accessing

sensitive data at the U.S. Department of Education. Judges in

other cases have said unions likely lack legal standing to sue.

WHICH AGENCIES HAVE BEEN TARGETED?

The U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID), which

provides a lifeline to the world's needy, has been shuttered and

thousands of its workers sent home.

Another agency, the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau,

which protects Americans from unscrupulous lenders, has also

been shut down. Many CFPB employees received termination

notices.

Among conflict-of-interest questions cited by critics, the

CFPB has investigated claims about Tesla's loan policies. DOGE

has also moved into NASA, an agency where some of Musk's

companies have billions of dollars in government contracts.

Last week, U.S.

lawmakers raised questions about whether Musk would

interfere or take over a $2.4 billion Federal Aviation

Administration telecommunications contract with rival Verizon

. U.S. Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy has said DOGE

staff are on site at FAA.

Thousands of workers have been targeted for dismissal at

federal agencies such as the National Oceanic and Atmospheric

Administration (NOAA), which provides weather forecasting and

climate data; the Social Security Administration (SSA), which

provides benefits to retirees and the disabled; the

tax-collecting Internal Revenue Service; and the U.S. Forest

Service, which manages millions of acres of national forests and

grassland.