(Radio Iowa) – The U-S Senate is debating a package of nine BILLION dollars in federal budget cuts — carrying out many of the cuts identified by Elon Musk’s Department of Government Efficiency or DOGE. Iowa Republican Joni Ernst has been leading the Senate’s DOGE Caucus. “Overseas projects without merit are being ended and the tax-dollars that were paying for them will be refunded,” Ernst said, “if the Senate passes the recissions bill.”

Ernst says the U-S Agency for International Development became a rogue bureaucracy, operating with little accountability. “Money intended to aleviate economic distress in war-torn Ukraine was spent sending models and designers on junkets to New York City and ‘Fashion Weeks’ in Paris and London,” Ernst said, “at a cost of more than $203,000.” Ernst points to other U-S-A-I-D spending in Ukraine, including two million dollars for a custom carpet maker and 300-thousand dollars to a dog collar manufacturer.

U.S. Senator Joni Ernst (R-Red Oak, Iowa) (official photo)

“Two million dollars went toward, get this folks, promoting tourism to Lebanon — a nation our very own State Department wars against traveling to,” Ernst said. Ernst says there’s no shortage of questionable spending by U-S-A-I-D. “President Trump is putting an end to this ‘Deep State’ operation,” Ernst said. “The foreign assistance programs that do advance American interests are now being administered under the watchful eye of Secretary (of State) Marco Rubio.”

Ernst also cites the bill’s cancellation of over one BILLION dollars in taxpayer support of public broadcasting networks. “NPR and PBS have a right to say whatever the heck they want,” Ernst said, “but they don’t have a right to force hardworking Americans to pay for their political propaganda being masked as a public service.” Once Senate debate ends, the bill appears poised to pass, with Vice President J.D. Vance casting the tie-breaking vote.

There were some procedural votes leading up to today (Wednesday) and Vance’s vote was necessary after three Republican senators joining Democrats in seeking to block debate of the bill.