Trump's new 'DOGE' department: Musk and Ramaswamy to slash waste
President-elect Donald Trump announced plans to create a "Department of Government Efficiency" (DOGE), led by Elon Musk, the founder of SpaceX and Tesla, alongside businessman Vivek Ramaswamy, who participated in the Republican Party presidential primaries. Their goal is to cut spending and dismantle bureaucracy.
Donald Trump announced that the new "department" would serve as an external advisory body intended to work with the White House on structural reforms of the state. As he promised during the election campaign, it will be headed by billionaire Elon Musk, a Trump campaign supporter, along with his former rival in the Republican primaries, businessman Vivek Ramaswamy.
Together, these two wonderful Americans will pave the way for my Administration to dismantle Government Bureaucracy, slash excess regulations, cut wasteful expenditures, and restructure Federal Agencies - Essential to the ‘Save America’ Movement, Trump wrote in his statement.
"This will send shockwaves through the system, and anyone involved in Government waste, which is a lot of people!" Musk said, as quoted in Trump's statement. Trump announced that the department is to complete its work by the 250th anniversary of the USA's independence, July 4, 2026.
The idea for the commission—and its name—was the brainchild of Elon Musk, originally from South Africa and owner of Tesla, SpaceX, and the X platform. The acronym for its name (Department of Government Efficiency, DOGE) references a popular internet meme featuring a Shiba Inu dog. Musk previously promoted a cryptocurrency named Dogecoin, inspired by the meme. On Tuesday, he announced that all DOGE activities would be published online "for maximum transparency."
Musk to create a ranking of foolish expenditures
"We will also have a leaderboard for most insanely dumb spending of your tax dollars. This will be both extremely tragic and extremely entertaining," Musk wrote on his platform. He also published the "logo" of the new "department," depicting the meme-famous dog.
Even during the election campaign, critics of the idea pointed out the potential conflict of interest involving Musk, whose company SpaceX relies heavily on contracts with NASA and the Pentagon.
