Hegseth Announces $5.1b In Defense Department Spending Cuts

Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth signed a memorandum Thursday outlining $5.1 billion in cuts to Department of Defense spending through terminated contracts. 

The Pentagon leader said the contracts amounted to “nonessential spending” on third-party consultants for services “more efficiently” performed by the department’s workforce using existing resources. 

"We need this money to spend on better health care for our warfighters and their families, instead of $500 an hour business process consultant," he said in a statement announcing the cuts. "That's a lot of consulting."

Hegseth said a Defense Health Agency contract for consulting services from Accenture, Deloitte, Booz Allen and other firms was discontinued alongside an Air Force contract with Accenture to resell third-party enterprise cloud IT services.

A Navy contract for business process consulting services was also eliminated as was a Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency’s contract for IT helpdesk services was canceled, according to Hegseth.

He added that the department is also slashing 11 contracts related to diversity, equity and inclusion, climate change, the COVID-19 pandemic and related “nonessential activities.”  

“If you're keeping score at home, today's cuts bring our running total to nearly $6 billion in wasteful spending over the first six weeks of the Department of Government Efficiency effort here at the Defense Department," Hegseth said.

The moves come after the Defense secretary cut $70 million in funding at three colleges in the past weeks in the Trump administration’s overhaul of federal spending. 

Pentagon officials are also seeking to reduce the department's workforce by 5 percent to 8 percent of its civilian employees over the next several months totaling 50,000 to 60,000 jobs.