in effect
This is Executive Order 14158, signed January 20, 2025 and published in the Federal Register on January 29, 2025. It establishes a “Department of Government Efficiency” (DOGE) to carry out the President’s stated agenda of modernizing federal technology and software. The order directs how DOGE is structured, who runs it, and what access it gets to agency systems.
The existing U.S. Digital Service is renamed the U.S. DOGE Service (USDS) and placed within the Executive Office of the President, led by a USDS Administrator who reports to the White House Chief of Staff. A separate “U.S. DOGE Service Temporary Organization” is created to run an 18-month agenda and is set to shut down on July 4, 2026. Within 30 days, every covered agency head must set up a “DOGE Team” of at least four employees — typically a team lead, an engineer, a human resources specialist, and an attorney — chosen in consultation with the USDS Administrator. The order launches a Software Modernization Initiative and requires agencies to give USDS full and prompt access to all unclassified agency records, software, and IT systems, to the extent allowed by law. It also states that it overrides earlier executive orders and regulations that would block that access, where the President has authority to change them.
Federal agencies and their heads are directly affected, since each must staff a DOGE Team and open its unclassified records and IT systems to USDS. The order specifically excludes the Executive Office of the President from the definition of “Agency.” The order also states it creates no new legal rights that any person or party could enforce in court, and that it is carried out subject to existing law and available funding.