The News
Just two weeks into Trump’s second term, the US president’s chief cost-cutter, tech billionaire Elon Musk, has declared war on the federal bureaucracy — sparking an outcry over the vast and rapid flexing of power by a private individual.
The head of the newly formed Department of Government Efficiency has in recent days offered two million government workers’ buyouts to resign, begun dismantling foreign aid agency USAID, gained access to Treasury systems that control trillions of dollars in payments, and instructed staffers to probe the Department of Education with a view to closing it.
SIGNALS
Trump downplays Musk’s influence, but ‘helplessness’ is setting in
President Trump moved to downplay Musk’s power within the administration, telling reporters Monday that he “can’t and won’t do anything without our approval.” a “sense of helplessness” is already setting in among senior government officials, The New York Times reported. DOGE agents are operating in a haphazard and opaque way — working on multiple projects and different agencies and using different email addresses which has added to the anxiety within the civil service, The Times wrote. And Musk’s team is secretive, often declining to share their surnames and describing meetings with employees — some of whom were asked what projects they were working on and who should be fired — as “one-way interviews.”
Unelected and unchecked, Musk has plenty of room to run...
The South African-born billionaire is operating “beyond scrutiny,” US historian Douglas Brinkley told The New York Times, and currently has limitless room to run: “There is not one single entity holding Musk accountable. It’s a harbinger of the destruction of our basic institutions.” One limiting factor to Musk’s assault on the government, however, is if he is able to remain in Trump’s good books as he carries out the “dirty work” of shrinking the federal government, Politico wrote: “He’s fine with Elon being the bad guy, a person close to the president told the outlet, but the US leader “could always change his mind about the situation if there is a political price to pay down the road.”
... but his ‘administrative coup’ will face legal challenges
Musk’s “administrative coup” echoes his chaotic takeover of Twitter, which was marked by an extreme slashing of staff and spending at the outset with a view to fixing problems later, The Atlantic wrote. Unlike Twitter — now X — the federal government is “big and complex,” a former executive said, meaning attempts to dismantle it will face legal challenges and congressional backlash. Lawsuits have already been filed to block DOGE’s access to Treasury payment systems, for example, and federal ethics experts told NPR that Musk’s ownership of various companies could see him fall foul of conflict-of-interest laws. Still, court cases take time to resolve, and “who knows what kind of damage [Musk and DOGE] could inflict before that happens,” a former ambassador said.