National Public Radio (NPR) misquoted a former Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) staffer, twisting his comments on government performance before later issuing a correction.
In a June 5 article titled “Former DOGE engineer says he was ‘surprised’ by ‘how efficient’ the government is,” NPR quoted Sahil Lavingia acknowledging the unexpected competence he encountered inside the federal bureaucracy. However, the piece stopped short of conveying his larger point forcing the outlet to issue a correction on Friday.
“I did not find the federal government to be rife with waste, fraud and abuse. I was expecting some more easy wins. I was hoping for opportunity to cut waste, fraud and abuse. And I do believe that there is a lot of waste. There’s minimal amounts of fraud. And abuse, to me, feels relatively nonexistent,” Lavingia told NPR when asked about the lack of fraud and spending abuse he saw. “And the reason is — I think we have a bias as people coming from the tech industry where we worked at companies, you know, such as Google, Facebook, these companies that have plenty of money, are funded by investors and have lots of people kind of sitting around doing nothing.”
Weeks after the article was published, NPR issued a correction:
“A previous version of this web story and its headline incorrectly reported that Sahil Lavingia, a former employee of DOGE, said that he found waste and fraud to be ‘relatively nonexistent’ in the federal government. In fact, he said that he believes abuse was ‘relatively nonexistent,’ that ‘there’s minimal amounts of fraud’ and that ‘there is a lot of waste.’”
Former NPR editor Uri Berliner accused the outlet in April 2024 of abandoning journalistic standards in its coverage of then former President Donald Trump. In an essay for The Free Press, Berliner alleged that NPR pursued debunked Russia-collusion claims and aligned its reporting with Democratic narratives.
Berliner also condemned NPR’s editorial leadership for refusing to cover the Hunter Biden laptop story in 2020, claiming they dismissed it as a “distraction.” He argued that the network’s internal culture prioritized race and identity over viewpoint diversity, resulting in lopsided coverage and an aggressive push for diversity, equity and inclusion (DEI) initiatives.
The White House sent Congress a $9.4 billion rescissions package that included $1.1 billion in cuts to the Corporation for Public Broadcasting, which funds NPR and PBS. The House of Representatives voted to pass the package on June 12.
NPR did not immediately respond to the Daily Caller News Foundation’s request for comment.
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