A former member of Elon Musks government efficiency team has become an online sensation after detailing how he helped identify and terminate DEI grants from inside the federal bureaucracy.
According to Gateway Pundit, the renewed attention follows the release of a substantial cache of discovery documents last week that exposed how President Trumps Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) moved swiftly to safeguard taxpayer funds.
The records, produced in response to a lawsuit brought by left-wing academic organizations, outline how DOGEs Small Agencies Team effectively dismantled the National Endowment for the Humanities (NEH), eliminating an extraordinary 97 percent of its grants, according to Inside Higher Ed.
For years, the NEH had functioned as a taxpayer-funded pipeline for progressive activism cloaked in academic jargon, a pattern that was abruptly disrupted in January of last year when President Trump signed a series of executive orders cutting off federal support for diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI), gender ideology, and radical environmental projects.
At the center of this effort was 28-year-old tech entrepreneur Nate Cavanaugh, co-founder of Special, who was tasked with overseeing small agencies, including the NEH. Cavanaugh, described by allies as one of Musks most effective DOGE operatives, helped eliminate 97 percent of the agencys grants and reduce its workforce by 65 percent in a remarkably short period, a record he defended unapologetically in a January 2026 deposition that has since gone viral.
In that deposition, an opposing attorney attempted to shame Cavanaugh over the human impact of the cuts. You dont regret that people might have lost important income to support their lives? the attorney asked, to which Cavanaugh responded, No. I think it was more important to reduce the federal deficit from $2 trillion to close to zero. When pressed further Did you reduce the federal deficit? Cavanaugh answered with disarming candor: No, we didnt.
The exchange underscored a fundamental clash of priorities between a bureaucracy focused on subsidizing activist careers and reformers intent on fiscal restraint in a nation burdened with $36 trillion in debt. For Cavanaugh and his colleagues, the issue was not whether individual grant recipients might lose a stream of government income, but whether Washington should be financing ideological projects at all. That tension became even clearer when the attorney began confronting him with specific grants he and fellow DOGE staffer Justin Fox had labeled among the craziest.
One such grant read: This is a history of the HIV/AIDS prison movement and its legacies in the United States. My book project narrates how activists fought the convergence of HIV/AIDS and incarceration and argues that this organizing holds legacies in the prison abolition movement feminist and queer insights LGBTQ studies. Asked, Why did you identify this as one of the craziest grants? Cavanaugh replied, Um, because it references, um, feminist and queer insights into prison abolition and LGBTQ studies. When the attorney followed up Any other reasons? Cavanaugh answered simply, No.
Another grant, steeped in identity politics, was titled Examining Military Service from the Margins: The Complicated Service Discussion Series will bring together veterans and community members to examine the experiences of service members who identify themselves as female, Black, Native American, LGBTQ, or an immigrant, and the dynamics, reasoning, and strength behind serving a country that does not always serve you in return. Cavanaugh confirmed that he had also flagged this proposal, stating, Yes because it explicitly says LGBTQ. To critics of DEI, these examples illustrated how far the NEH had drifted from promoting broad-based humanities scholarship into underwriting niche ideological activism.
The attorney then tried to undermine Cavanaughs credibility by questioning his academic and bureaucratic background. Do you have any history in scholarly peer review? the lawyer asked, to which Cavanaugh replied, No. The attorney pressed further: So this judgment call was made by you and your personal judgment to cancel grants based on DEI? Cavanaugh did not hesitate: Yes.
The most revealing moment came when the attorney challenged the very idea that a young outsider should wield such authority over entrenched institutions. Do you think its inappropriate in any way that someone in their 20s with no experience with grants or federal government was making personal judgment calls? he asked.
Cavanaugh answered, No, I dont think its inappropriate. When asked, Why not? he elaborated, I think a person can have enough judgment from reading books and being well-informed outside of traditional experience to make judgment calls about obvious things like a grant that literally lists DEI in its description to know whether it violates an executive order.
Seeking to portray him as unqualified, the attorney then asked, What books would you have read that would have informed your opinion? Cavanaughs reply was blunt: There were no books. For many conservatives, that line captured the essence of the DOGE project a rejection of bureaucratic credentialism and ideological gatekeeping in favor of common sense, clear reading of executive orders, and a willingness to say no to taxpayer-funded social engineering.
The episode highlights a broader realignment in Washington, where younger reformers are challenging long-standing liberal patronage networks embedded in agencies like the NEH. As the legal battles continue and more internal documents surface, the central question is no longer whether these grants provided income to activists, but whether the federal government should be in the business of financing DEI-driven, identity-based projects at all especially when the nation is drowning in debt and voters are demanding accountability for every dollar spent.
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