Sanders and other GOP governors support Musk and Ramaswamy appointments

Gov. Sarah Huckabee Sanders and 25 other Republican governors support President-elect Trump's "appointment of Elon Musk and Vivek Ramaswamy and agree with their assertion that the federal government needs to be cut down to size," they wrote in a letter last week.

The big picture: Trump tapped Ramaswamy and Musk to run the new, non-governmental Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE).

• The specifics are still murky, but Trump has signaled he wants to give the pair broad authority to cut what they see as bloat within the government, Axios' Erin Doherty reports.
• Ramaswamy told Axios co-founder Mike Allen he expects DOGE to recommend major cuts to the federal workforce as part of a broader mission to shrink the unelected "fourth branch of government."

What they're saying: "... DOGE will help end federal overspending by taking aim at the $500 billion plus in annual federal expenditures that are unauthorized by Congress or being used in ways that Congress never intended, from $535 million a year to the Corporation for Public Broadcasting and $1.5 billion for grants to international organizations to nearly $300 million to progressive groups like Planned Parenthood," the duo penned in a November Wall Street Journal op-ed.

The bottom line: The governors' letter, addressed to Sen. Majority Leader John Thune and Speaker of the House Rep. Mike Johnson.

• The coalition of governors "request that Congress work alongside [Trump] to solidify the efficiencies that are found into law."