Trump Signs Order Establishing ‘National Design Studio’ to Improve Digital, Physical Federal Spaces

Trump signed the order in a closed-door signing session on Thursday, meaning the press was not invited to watch the event. The order launches an initiative called “America by Design,” which establishes the National Design Studio, according to a White House fact sheet:

• The Order establishes the National Design Studio and the role of Chief Design Officer to facilitate design improvements in both digital and physical Federal spaces.
  • The National Design Studio will work to reduce duplicative design costs, leverage standardized design, and dramatically improve the quality of public interactions with government services.
  • The Chief Design Officer will help recruit top private-sector designers to facilitate this effort.
• The Order directs agency heads to collaborate with the Chief Design Officer to implement the America by Design initiative at their respective agencies.
  • This includes improving websites and physical interfaces, updating the United States Web Design System (USWDS), and ensuring government-wide compliance with the 21^st Century IDEA Act.

In the order itself, Trump emphasizes “the Government has lagged behind in usability and aesthetics” and the need to “fill the digital potholes across our Nation.” 

According to the White House, there are an estimated 26,000 federally operated websites in the United States. 

“Legacy government systems are costly to maintain and notoriously difficult for Americans to navigate, wasting time and resources,” the fact sheet notes. “Poorly designed digital and physical interfaces undermine public trust in high-impact Federal service providers.”

As noted in the fact sheet, Americans have already seen benefits from the Trump administration’s efforts to modernize federal services and systems, with a 37 percent drop in the backlog of veterans waiting for benefits. A similar happening has been seen with Social Security services. Call waiting times have dropped 73 percent, and field office wait times have dropped by 30 percent, Trump and the White House said last week. 

Breitbart News

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