Blackburn vows Tennessee-style DOGE initiative to root out waste and fraud in state government

Tennessee Gov.-elect Marsha Blackburn revealed that she plans to launch a state-level version of the now disbanded Department of Government Efficiency when she takes office in January after making government spending one of her administration’s top priorities.

Speaking on Just the News No Noise, Blackburn, a Republican who served as the Volunteer State's U.S. senator in 2018 and won election earlier this month to become the state's governor, said her administration would work with state lawmakers to identify waste, fraud and potential savings in Tennessee’s budget.

“One of the things we’re going to be working on right out of the gate is a Tennessee-style DOGE and rooting out where there is waste or fraud in the state budget,” Blackburn said. 

Blackburn noted that Tennessee balances its budget annually but said a comprehensive "good sweep" of the budget would help identify opportunities to reduce spending.

She also expressed support for changing the state’s approach to budgeting, suggesting that lawmakers adopt two-year budgets to keep spending growth under control.

“I’ve felt for years that we needed to reform our budget process and look at two-year budgets so that we have one year that we were appropriating and another year that we were doing oversight,” she said. "And that would be a way to kind of keep the budget growth in check, so this may be a good opportunity for us to basically hold spending steady if we can do it as a two-year document."

Blackburn said a two-year budget could provide an opportunity to “basically hold spending steady” while giving lawmakers more time to oversee government operations.

Lawmakers also need to finish work on a reconciliation bill, Blackburn says

Blackburn outlined several legislative priorities she hopes Congress will complete before the end of the year. She named the No Fakes Act, the Kids Online Safety Act, the Farm Bill and the annual defense authorization legislation.

She said lawmakers also need to finish work on a reconciliation bill focused on spending reductions in addition to advancing judicial nominations and other Trump administration nominations. 

Blackburn, who will become Tennessee’s first female governor, pointed to Tennessee’s lack of a state income tax, lighter regulation and vast business opportunities as major reasons people continue to relocate there. “It’s important that they leave those blue state values at the state line,” Blackburn said, referencing people moving to Tennessee.

Tennessee's net domestic migration, the difference between inbound and outbound movers to and from other states, resulted in the addition of 42,389 citizens in 2025 to the state's population, according to The University of Tennessee's State Data Center.

The governor-elect also addressed the impeachment effort by Rep. Thomas Massie, R-Ky., against Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth. That chamber's resolution failed in the GOP-led House on Tuesday night, and Blackburn dismissed the possibility of the Senate advancing an impeachment effort if it made it out of the House.

“The Senate is not in the mood for that,” she said. “I think that if they get that out of the House, and that’s a big if, I think you would see that tabled.”