Antonio Gracias: DOGE updates, Voter fraud arrests, Finding 'Big Balls' | All-In Live from Miami

**David Sacks** (0:01)
Where's Antonio Gracias? Bring him up. How bad is it? How messed up is our government?

**Antonio Gracias** (0:07)
So if Twitter was like the JV League, this is like the NBA. It's the most complex thing I've ever seen.

**Chamath Palihapitiya** (0:13)
How is he able to find big balls?

**Jason Calacanis** (0:15)
Where do they show up? Do they just apply out of the blue? I mean, where do these guys come from?

**David Sacks** (0:18)
You found some people who were illegal immigrants who registered to vote?

**Antonio Gracias** (0:22)
Yes, this is actually true. Every vote that is cast illegally in America nullifies the vote of an American citizen.

**David Sacks** (0:30)
So Antonio, we know you're very busy because you decided like a couple of our other friends to take a second job working in our government for a 100 or so days. You can give him a round of applause for that.
You know, Trump is a unique individual in all the world. There's maybe polarizing in some ways, but one thing that's not polarizing is DOGE. I think everybody wants to see waste, fraud and abuse and controlled spending in government. Maybe there's some questions about how fast it's going, but we all know you and Elon like to go, you know, at a brisk pace. You laid back and you joined a little later in the process, like a stat you joined maybe what, 15, 20 days ago?

**Antonio Gracias** (1:16)
I've been there for eight weeks.

**David Sacks** (1:18)
Eight weeks, okay. So it's been like 60 days and you went public with it maybe a couple of weeks ago.

**Antonio Gracias** (1:23)
Yeah. I was in Woodlawn, Maryland for the first four weeks, so you didn't know I was there.

**David Sacks** (1:26)
Yes. So how bad is it? How messed up is our government? How insane are the processes? You're a process guy. You know, we both worked on the Twitter acquisition and the transfer there and did all the zero-based budgeting.
I mean, maybe compare and contrast it to that, which was maybe one of the most horrific corporate entities I've ever seen in my life, and how that was being run.

**Antonio Gracias** (1:53)
It was tough. Well, let me say thank you guys. Thank you for having me. I really appreciate it. It's great to be down here to see everybody.
Let me also say that it's an honor to serve America. Whatever I am doing, I am grateful to be able to do it. I'm grateful to my partners for allowing me to do it and my clients for supporting it. It truly is an honor to be there. There's many great people in the government trying to help. So let me start with that.

**David Sacks** (2:14)
This is sacrifice, right? You're taking time out of your day job.

**Antonio Gracias** (2:18)
It's definitely a sacrifice, but really I feel very grateful at the capacity and 30 years of training in the operations that I can be useful.
I feel gratitude. Yeah, how bad is it? So if Twitter was like the JV League, this is like the NBA. It's the most complex thing I've ever seen. I have in our office in DC., I have a, I've mapped now as an example, the entire system of basically from the border to the benefits programs. It's about a 40 foot board and it looks like a bus. Yeah, I mean, it's an incredible like spaghetti gram stuff. And yeah, I've never seen anything so complex in my life. So the answer to your question is it's worse than I thought, much, much worse than what we saw at Twitter Now X and America, Americans and all of you, we deserve better.

**David Sacks** (3:11)
Okay. If we were to, and I'm sure Chamath has some questions in Freebird, but if we were to look at one dollar spent by our government, waste, fraud, abuse, how many pennies of the dollar is it? If you had to, just based on what you've seen so far, a range.

**Antonio Gracias** (3:31)
Here's what Sacks, if you go into any company, any company you guys have ever seen that is not like super well run, it probably is like easy cut 15 percent. Easy, easy, easy.
This is where the 15, this is where the trillion dollar number came from, 15 percent of seven billion dollars. I think if we had the political will, you'd easily get that 15 percent, no problem. Not without any problem at all, and without cutting the core entitlement programs. So it's definitely there. The question is, do people want to do it or not? And remember, every dollar we take, we are taking from an NGO or a beltway consultant. It's actually the people are screaming about this because we're taking money from them. And it is, whatever you read in the news media, I got to tell you, it isn't true. I mean, the cuts, I think it's 88 percent of the people that have left the government have taken packages. The packages are very lucrative. There's nine months or so of severance, and they're voluntary. So, yeah, I tell you, I'd also say the people that work in government are good. There's lots of good people in the government that I have met and have pointed this at all this stuff. They deserve better. Okay? Imagine trying to be a civil servant. You want to do the right thing. You're working there because you care about America, and you're in this, like, massive bureaucratic morass with all this stuff on top of you. And, man, I've seen, like, I've seen OIG reports where the people have reported to OIG, like, sex trafficking, and they turn it in and nothing happens. Like, literally nothing happens. Okay, so that's very frustrating, and they stick it out, they keep going, and they keep working hard for America. So I think it's not just about the cost cuts, it's about the culture. Like, the culture change of allowing good people who are in the government to understand that someone's listening, that when they want to make improvement change, or when they find fraud, waste, and abuse, they can do it, and there's an avenue now to do it. I think that's actually gonna be one of the most important, lasting thing we leave, is this idea that your voice matters in the government, that there are good people in the government, and when they want to do the right thing, there's a way to do it.