Elon Musk hammers large-scale government spending
Elon Musk says most of the savings made by the Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) will be wiped out within a year by President Donald Trump's freshly unveiled 'big, beautiful bill.' Musk made the astounding comments during a blistering interview aired on Sunday despite initially declaring he only wanted to avoid discussing 'presidential policy' and stick to 'spaceships'.
In a previously released clip last week, Musk took aim at Trump's bill saying that he didn't think it could be both big and beautiful - just one or the other. Speaking just days after officially leaving his advisory post, Musk warned that Trump's sweeping legislation would quickly obliterate the fiscal reforms DOGE had fought for. 'I was, like, disappointed to see the massive spending bill, frankly, which increases the budget deficit, doesn't decrease it, and undermines the work that the DOGE team is doing,' Musk told CBS Sunday Morning.
The 'big, beautiful bill,' hailed by Trump as the keystone of his second-term agenda, proposes $5 trillion in tax cuts alongside aggressive new spending hikes, lifting the debt ceiling by more than $4 trillion over two years. Despite its ambitions, reshaping tax law, overhauling immigration policy, and slashing Medicaid benefits in the future, Musk believes the bill is fundamentally at odds with the hard choices DOGE made to streamline government. 'I actually thought that, when this "big, beautiful bill" came along, it'd be like, everything he's done on DOGE gets wiped out in the first year,' CBS reporter David Pogue said bluntly. 'I think a bill can be big or it can be beautiful... but I don't know if it could be both. My personal opinion,' Musk laughed.
It was a rare, public rebuke of Trump from Musk - a man once dubbed the president's 'first buddy' and hailed on the campaign trail as a 'truly incredible guy' by Trump himself. Musk spent $288 million supporting Trump's election and became a fixture at the White House, invited into Cabinet meetings and leading the charge to slash federal bureaucracy with DOGE's chainsaw-wielding fervor. But after months of political warfare, Musk's relationship with Washington, and with Trump, has cooled. Lawsuits and protests coupled with a 71 percent crash in Tesla profits followed DOGE's drastic cuts which saw 250,000 federal workers either fired or bought out across every federal department. Musk saw grants slashed and staffing culled at environmental agencies including the EPA and NOAA, despite decades of warning about the risks of climate change.
Musk's personal net worth shrank by $100 billion, whilst government workers blamed DOGE for everything from Social Security delays to shuttered national parks. 'It's a bit unfair because DOGE became the whipping boy for everything,' Musk said. 'If there was some cut, real or imagined, everyone would blame DOGE. 'I've had people think that, like, somehow, DOGE is going to stop them from getting their Social Security check which is completely untrue,' he went on. 'We became essentially the DOGE boogeyman, where any cut anywhere would be ascribed to DOGE,' he said. Originally touting a $2 trillion savings goal, Musk later revised his target to $1 trillion. In the end, Musk claims DOGE managed to slash an estimated $175 billion before his departure - a far cry from his lofty ambitions.
Yet now, with Trump's bill promising $3.8 trillion in added debt over the next decade, Musk believes even those savings would essentially be rendered meaningless. 'We do expect, over time, to achieve a trillion,' Musk explained on Friday during his farewell press conference, but it was also clear he knew that a huge wave of fresh spending would overwhelm any of DOGE's victories. Musk's departure came after CBS previewed the interview in which he criticized the bill in a clip that quickly went viral and reached the Oval Office within hours. The timing was no coincidence: Musk's formal 130-day stint as a 'Special Government Employee' was over - yet until that moment, Musk seemed to imply that he would continue contributing to White House efforts part-time. At an Oval Office farewell event on Friday, both men tried to downplay the rupture.
Trump presented Musk with a ceremonial gold key, praising him as a 'very special person.' 'Elon's really not leaving,' Trump said. 'He's going to be back and forth, I think. I have a feeling. DOGE is gonna continue, just as a way of life,' Musk told CBS. 'I will have some participation in that, but as I've said publicly, my focus has to be on the companies at this point.' Sporting a noticeable black eye that he claimed to have received from a playful punch by his son 'Little X' he also made sure to praise the president one last time. The DOGE team is doing an incredible job. They're going to continue doing an incredible job, and I will continue to be visiting here and be a friend and advisor to the president,' Musk said. Despite the highly choreographed moment, there still appeared to be some tension.
'My frank opinion of the government is that it's just like the DMV that got big, okay?' Musk told CBS. 'When you say, "Let's have the government do something," you should think: "Do you want the DMV to do it?" 'It's not like I agree with everything the administration does. But we have differences of opinion. There are things that I don't entirely agree with. But it's difficult for me to bring that up in an interview because then it creates a bone of contention,' Musk explained. 'So then, I'm a little stuck in a bind, where I'm like, well, I don't want to, you know, speak up against the administration, but I also don't want to take responsibility for everything this administration's doing.' Following the CBS interview, Musk returned to SpaceX's Texas headquarters, where he attended the ninth test launch of Starship. As the massive rocket spiraled out of control and disintegrated upon re-entry, some observers couldn't help but note the symbolism. 'I can't guarantee success, but I can guarantee excitement,' Musk noted dryly.
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