WASHINGTON—Subcommittee on Cybersecurity, Information Technology, and Government Innovation Chairwoman Nancy Mace (R-S.C.) delivered opening remarks at today’s hearing on “Unlocking Government Efficiency Through IT Modernization.” In her remarks, Subcommittee Chairwoman Mace emphasized how the Trump Administration and DOGE are taking action to modernize obsolete, legacy IT to ensure government efficiency and effectiveness. She also touted her bipartisan bill, the Modernizing Government Technology Reform Act, which reforms and reauthorizes the Technology Modernization Fund so that it can continue to be used to assist with IT modernization initiatives moving forward. At today’s hearing, the panel will hear from the most senior technology leaders from the first Trump Administration on how to build efficient and effective IT.
Below are Subcommittee Chairwoman Mace’s prepared remarks.
Good afternoon and thank you for joining us for this discussion on federal IT modernization.
An important role of this Subcommittee is to ensure proper management of federal technology.
The Trump Administration and the U.S. DOGE Service—in their efforts to make the government more efficient—have prioritized modernizing government technology because they have rightly identified federal IT as the backbone for all government programs, operations, and spending.
Federal IT systems enable everything the government does—from national defense and homeland security to the administration of benefit programs.
And when these systems are outdated, obsolete, and unreliable, the government cannot carry out these duties responsibly or efficiently.
The federal government spends more than $100 billion annually on IT systems, with almost 80 percent of the spending going toward operating and maintaining them, including legacy systems.
These legacy systems—which are built on unsupported software or hardware and rely on outdated data centers or coding languages such as COBOL—create dangerous security and operational environments and are costly to maintain.
A few years ago, GAO compiled a list of the ten federal IT systems most in need of overhaul due to their criticality and their obsolescence.
One is a COBOL-based system used to process about 20 million federal student financial aid applications annually. The system is older than the Department of Education, which opened its doors in 1980.
I learned COBOL early in my career because coding provides a pathway for girls and women to advance into STEM fields.
But today’s aspiring coders are not learning COBOL.
That’s why, on his first day in office, President Trump signed Executive Order 14158 titled “Establishing and Implementing the President’s ‘Department of Government Efficiency.’”
This Executive Order established DOGE through a reorganization of what was formerly known as the U.S. Digital Service, an entity this Subcommittee has collaborated with on a bipartisan basis for many years to promote IT modernization.
The Trump Executive Order includes a requirement for the U.S. DOGE Service to “work with Agency Heads to promote interoperability between agency networks and systems, ensure data integrity, and facilitate responsible data collection and synchronization.”
This directive prioritizes efforts aligned with long-time industry best practices and expert recommendations for IT modernization.
It also elevates the work USDS has been doing across the three previous Administrations under presidents Obama, Trump, and Biden.
Today, we’re here to celebrate the progress that has been made to modernize government technology, review the approaches that have worked, and discuss how the current Trump Administration and the renewed USDS can aggressively prioritize proven solutions so we can finally make real progress in building efficient and effective federal IT.
To this end, we’re joined today by three of the most senior technology leaders from the first Trump Administration.
Ms. Kent, Ms. Graves, and Ms. Roat, you served at the beginning of the COVID-19 pandemic and helped oversee the start of the federal government’s shift to remote work.
During this time, we learned that a lot of processes were so paper-based and arcane they couldn’t be carried out digitally.
This lack of resiliency in government operations created drastic consequences for our constituents who couldn’t connect with government offices to receive benefits or file required paperwork.
I’m looking forward to hearing from you all about what you learned during this unique time in your government service.
And it’s my understanding that this is your first time all testifying together on the same panel—thanks for being here today.
Speaking of proven solutions, during the first Trump Administration, the Modernizing Government Technology Act of 2017 was signed into law.
This Act established the Technology Modernization Fund or TMF, which creates a unique funding vehicle that can be used to improve, retire, or replace federal IT systems.
The TMF is a necessary piece of the IT modernization puzzle. Without it, the unpredictability of the annual budget cycle would make it too difficult for some modernization projects to get off the ground.
Last week, I re-introduced the Modernizing Government Technology Reform Act alongside Oversight Committee Ranking Member Gerry Connolly.
This bill reforms and reauthorizes the TMF so that it can continue to be used to assist with IT modernization initiatives moving forward.