Here's the plan to fix what DOGE broke after Trump's term in office
Plus: Macron’s aviators put a global spotlight on this French luxury eyewear brand
A group of former government workers are developing a plan that a future administration can use to rebuild government services damaged by DOGE.
Tech Viaduct, an initiative launched by the left-leaning think tank Searchlight Institute, is made up of former senior government officials with experience in agencies including U.S. Digital Service (USDS), the Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) and General Services Administration (GSA). Its goal is to create a plan for how the federal government might repair and improve its digital presence, services, and processes. And fast.
The group’s thinking is that actual implementation of government reform requires a long lead time, but political party mandates only last until the next election, so the next administration can’t afford to spend two years studying the problem. Instead, the next president needs to hit the ground running.
“It’s the combination of rigid short deadlines, such as legislation or election calendars, and every action happening extremely slowly,” Mikey Dickerson, a former administrator of USDS from 2014 to 2017 who’s now working in leadership for Tech Viaduct, says of the slow pace of government work.
“It’s good to slow down and be careful when figuring out how a change is going to impact people,” he tells me. “It’s not good when minor technical decision requires approval from 35 committee members, representing 40 different agendas. That second type of slowness needs to be pruned way back.”
A tactical plan for the future
Tech Viaduct’s objectives are to draw up a tactical plan for a future administration with options that vary based on political circumstances, including day-one executive actions and wider ambitions that could pass with support from Congress. With three more years left in President Donald Trump’s final term, the scope of their work is a moving target.
Part of their work is administrative, technical, and boring to the average civilian, like reforming government procurement, personnel, and oversight systems. But another part is public-facing: building visibility in order to drive adoption and support for the initiative. Americans often compare government services to that of the private sector, and the government is often found wanting. A brand rehab has long been in order.
Before it folded last year, the so-called Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE), was created out of USDS, the executive branch’s digital office. In place of those entities is the National Design Studio, a new office that launched last August and is headed by Airbnb cofounder Joe Gebbia. The office has given Trump initiatives the sheen of Silicon Valley web design, masking an agenda of government cuts in a shiny wrapper. This initiative is less interested in such window dressing, according to the plan it’s outlined so far.
Tech Viaduct’s idea for day-one digital repair
Dickerson says he imagines a future president’s day-one executive orders could include a direction that agencies cooperate with a “triage team” to determine digital risks and needs, or stabilize and restore government programs so that they can perform their intended purposes.
Other executive orders could instruct agencies to stop illegal or unsafe abuse of private data. He says he’d like to see a transparent accounting of what happened to public data under DOGE. His bigger goal is the long-term, systemic improvement to government procurement and the civil service.
“It won’t be an overnight miracle,” Dickerson says. “It’s not possible to build, fix, or repair as quickly or dramatically as you can do demolition.”
Project Searchlight says it will take years to correct DOGE’s damage, but the group also learned something from DOGE’s efforts: Changing government fast is possible if there’s sufficient political will.
“What could be done if the mandate and power of and urgency of DOGE was used to build more effective government services instead of tear them down?” Dickerson asks. Tech Viaduct seeks to find out.
This story first appeared in Fast Company.
Macron’s aviators put a global spotlight on this French luxury eyewear brand
Shop the news.
The day after French President Emmanuel Macron wore a pair of Henry Jullien Pacific S 01 aviator sunglasses during his speech at the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland, the world wanted to know more about his eyewear.
Search interest for Macron’s shiny, reflective sunglasses spiked Wednesday, and the French luxury eyewear brand’s website was down when this story was first published, though it’s back up today. All it takes is one world leader sporting a ready-to-wear garment or accessory for a brand to get a global spotlight — and just maybe become a meme.
Like interest shown to the Nike tracksuit Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro was pictured wearing earlier this month after he was seized by the U.S., interest in Macron’s shades is just the latest example of a newsmaker driving attention to a piece of fashion, and parlaying a news item into an internet meme. Before you could buy a “Make America Great Again” hat on President Donald Trump’s website back in 2016, he wore one himself. Watch the news and shop the look.
Macron’s shades, which cost 659 euros, or $770, weren’t worn primarily as a fashion statement, but to prevent something more unsightly, according to the explanation from his press office. Macron’s office told Reuters he wore the sunglasses because of a burst blood vessel in his eye, and he was indeed spotted last week with one bloodshot eye.
In Greenland, MAGA means “Make America Go Away”
Red hats have become a protest symbol against Trump’s calls to take over the island.
At recent demonstrations against the U.S. president’s threat to take over Greenland that were held from Copenhagen to Nuuk, protesters wore hats that turn an American political symbol on its head.
MAGA style-hats that read “Make America Go Away” and “Nu Det Nuuk” — a play on the Danish phrase for “Now It’s Enough” that substitutes Greenland’s capital city — are anti-MAGA. “I want to show my support to Greenland and also show that I don’t like the president of the United States,” one Copenhagen resident who wore the hat to a protest there told the Associated Press.
Like in Canada, where red hats last year similarly played off Trump’s campaign hat design as a statement against his threats of U.S. expansion, both Greenland and the Kingdom of Denmark, of which Greenland is a part, have red and white flags, giving the hats’ colors double meaning.
“The red MAGA hats have become a very visible political symbol, and so it seemed right to also make the anti-MAGA caps red and white too,” Jesper Rabe Tønnesen, a Copenhagen shop owner who began selling the hats last year told Fast Company.
For now, Greenland residents can rest easy that their voices and the message of their hats was heard. In Davos, Switzerland this week, Trump ruled out the U.S. taking the island by force and backed away from threatening tariffs on U.S. allies in Europe.
Have you seen this?
Trump wants to make the Wario of United Nations. I won’t lie to you: it still doesn’t feel normal to hear longtime U.S. allies talk about us like we broke up, but there’s a lot of that going on these days. [Whig by Hunter Schwarz]
DOGE employees shared social security data, court filing shows. Employees detailed to the Social Security Administration shared sensitive data through a nonsecure server, the Justice Department disclosed. [The New York Times]
You’re banned from blocking Trump’s face on your national park pass—but there’s a work-around. These designers found a clever way to keep the president’s mug off their America the Beautiful entry passes. [Fast Company]
WinRed has a new competitor. Not all Republicans are sold on it. A new player in the Republican donation processing space is the first real competitor to GOP small-dollar fundraising clearinghouse WinRed, but for now, at least, consultants are staying on the fence. [Campaigns & Elections]
These rejected Wikipedia logos are a ‘00s design time capsule. In honor of its 25th birthday, Wikipedia is looking back through the archives. [Creative Bloq]
