US President-elect Donald Trump have appointed billionaire Elon Musk and entrepreneur Vivek Ramaswamy to lead a new US Department of Government Efficiency.
The agency according to Mr. Trump will “dismantle Government Bureaucracy, slash excess regulations, cut wasteful expenditures, and restructure Federal Agencies.
Trump said the panel would partner with the White House’s Office of Management and Budget and said their work will conclude no later than 4 July, 2026 — the nation’s 250th anniversary.
The structure may allow Musk to avoid resigning from his companies including Tesla Inc., the world’s largest electric vehicle manufacturer, and SpaceX, which dominates the worldwide rocket launch market — and federal conflict-of-interest rules that could have mandated divestiture.
But it’s not clear what the size or structure will be, or how Musk and Ramaswamy will drive the dramatic overhaul of the government they’ve promised. Musk predicted he could cut at least $2 trillion from the US federal budget at Trump’s rally last month at Madison Square Garden, though that would exceed the amount Congress spends annually on government agency operations, including defense.
It would likely require making significant cuts to popular entitlement programs such as Social Security, Medicare, Medicaid and veterans’ benefits.
Last fiscal year, the government spent more than $6.75 trillion, with more than $5.3 trillion of that coming from Social Security, health care, defense and veterans’ benefits — all of which are politically fraught and notoriously difficult to convince Congress to cut — as well as interest on the debt.
“This will send shockwaves through the system, and anyone involved in Government waste, which is a lot of people,” Musk said Tuesday in a statement provided by the Trump transition effort.
Musk, 53, saw his net worth top $300 billion shortly after the election — the first time he’d surpassed that mark in almost three years. He is the only person to ever have a fortune in excess of $300 billion, according to Bloomberg’s wealth index. Tesla shares, which were trading about 1.5% lower in the after-hours session before Trump’s announcement, pared losses slightly after the news. Agecny reports
