Musk heads to US Congress to discuss slashing government costs

Elon Musk, the world's richest person and one of Donald Trump's closest allies, met with US lawmakers yesterday (5 December) on his plans for overseeing radical government spending cuts under the incoming administration.

President-elect Trump rewarded the Tesla, X and SpaceX chief for his support during the White House campaign by naming him head of the newly created Department of Government Efficiency, along with another wealthy ally, Vivek Ramaswamy.

Although the office, dubbed DOGE, has a purely advisory role, Musk's star power and intense influence in Trump's inner circle bring political clout.

As Musk and Ramaswamy strode into the Capitol for meetings with lawmakers, Republican Speaker Mike Johnson touted "a new day in America."

"There's an enormous amount of waste, fraud and abuse," he told reporters. "Government is too big, it does too many things, and it does almost nothing well."

Musk and Ramaswamy have said they can identify billions of dollars of cuts in spending, sparking questions about whether Republicans will even try to slash politically popular social security programs.

Wave of terminations

Writing in the Wall Street Journal last month, the two businessmen laid out plans for the White House to cut staff, trim government programs and reduce federal regulations, even if it means bypassing Congress, which holds budgetary power.

"The entrenched and ever-growing bureaucracy represents an existential threat to our republic, and politicians have abetted it for too long," Musk and Ramaswamy wrote. "We're doing things differently. We are entrepreneurs, not politicians.

During Trump's election campaign, Musk vowed to reduce federal spending by $2 trillion.

This would represent cutting total US spending by a third, almost certainly meaning devastation of social support programs -- something that has never garnered strong political backing.

Musk's emphasis on firing large numbers of government employees, however, echoes Republican talking points about the need to take on an overbearing state and may garner more support.

Musk says he is seeking "mass head-count reductions across the federal bureaucracy."

Musk suggested banning government employees from working at home as an opening tactic. "Requiring federal employees to come to the office five days a week would result in a wave of voluntary terminations that we welcome."

Cuts will also target subsidies to public broadcasters and groups such as Planned Parenthood, which campaigns for abortion access and offers an array of reproductive health services.

Social welfare

But DOGE is unlikely, at least initially, to go after welfare programs such as Social Security or health insurance for the poor and seniors, Ramaswamy said in an interview with Axios on Wednesday.

Such cuts should be "a policy decision that belongs to the voters" and their representatives in Congress, Ramaswamy said.

A reduction in military spending, which climbed to $820 billion in 2023, is also unlikely to be on the table.

Musk's new role raises the question of potential conflicts of interest, since he could be issuing policy recommendations that impact directly on his own business empire.

Underlining the close connection to DOGE, Musk's favorite cryptocurrency is called Dogecoin.