As part of its efforts to downsize the federal government, the Department of Government Efficiency has been pruning or limiting the travel and purchase credit cards used by various agencies.
As of Sunday, there had been 298,903 such cards either limited to $1 or outright deactivated, DOGE posted on X, split between 35,493 purchase cards and 263,410 travel cards.
The card cuts affect such independent agencies as the General Services Administration, Office of Personnel Management, Small Business Administration, Environmental Protection Agency, Social Security Administration and NASA.
The Cabinet departments included in those numbers are the Departments of Labor, Agriculture, Homeland Security, Education, Interior, Commerce, Treasury, State, Housing and Urban Development, and Health and Human Services.
DOGE has audited 55,587 purchase cards and 501,798 travel cards so far, meaning that the limits affect more than half of those that have been audited.
But this is only the beginning as DOGE is trying to audit around 4.6 million government credit cards across multiple agencies and departments.
The Interior Department has had the most purchase cards limited or canceled so far, at 18,636. DOGE is 89% of the way through the purchase card audit for that department.
For travel-related credit cards, there have been 47,003 cards canceled or limited for USDA, followed by 42,959 cards for HHS and 39,213 for the Interior Department; the travel card audits for these departments are 70%, 75% and 69% complete, respectively.
There are significant agency gaps though and some have kept most of their cards active with a limit of more than $1.
The USDA purchase card audit, which is only 14% complete, has preserved 10,679 cards out of 12,488 reviewed. Similarly, the DHS travel card audit, which is 16% complete, has preserved 158,495 cards out of 187,810 reviewed.
