Members of Elon Musk’s “department of government efficiency” arrived at the Pentagon Friday, in what appeared to be their first meeting with defense department staff, a US official told Reuters. The official spoke on condition of anonymity.
Donald Trump has said the Pentagon would be an early target of Musk’s government budget and personnel slashing team and that he expects the tech billionaire to find hundreds of billions of dollars in fraud and abuse in the department.
Last week, Trump confirmed that he had asked Musk to review spending in the sprawling defense department. “I’ve instructed him to go check out education, to check out the Pentagon, which is the military. And you know, sadly, you’ll find some things that are pretty bad.”
Defense department spending has long been the subject of debate across the political spectrum, with its budget approaching $1tn per year. In December, then president Joe Biden signed a bill authorizing $895bn in defense spending for the fiscal year. But Democrats have questioned whether Musk – an unelected official with lucrative contracts at the department through his company SpaceX – is the best poised to negotiate reforms.
In recent months, Trump has formed a close relationship with Musk as the world’s richest man spent $250m on the president’s re-election campaign. When he took office, Trump appointed Musk to lead the newly formed, so-called “department of government efficiency”.
Since then, the agency has called for mass layoffs across many government agencies, including the US Agency for International Development, the Department of Education, the Small Business Administration, the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau and the General Services Administration. More layoffs are expected to follow at the Internal Revenue Service, the Department of Agriculture, Veterans Affairs and Health and Human Services.
On Tuesday, Musk took questions from reporters alongside the president in an Oval Office ceremony regarding the closure of government offices. Next week, the pair are expected to appear together on Fox News in their first televised joint appearance.
Musk’s team’s meeting at the Pentagon came the same day it published classified information on its website, according to the Huffington Post. The leak included statistics from the National Reconnaissance Office, which operates spy satellites – including hundreds built by Musk’s SpaceX company. The office’s budgets and head counts are classified.
Also Friday, a federal judge extended a temporary order blocking Doge from accessing treasury records that contain sensitive personal data such as social security and bank account numbers for millions of Americans. The case alleges the Trump administration allowed Musk’s team access to the treasury department’s central payment system in violation of federal law.
A government watchdog is expected to launch an inquiry into security over the US treasury’s payments system.
Pete Hegseth, the defense secretary, another close Trump ally, has downplayed concerns about Musk’s agenda for the agency. Hegseth said he had already been in touch with Musk but on Tuesday added: “We’re not going to do things that are to the detriment of American operational or tactical capabilities.” Hegseth has said he wants to increase overall US defense spending.
