Elon Musk confirmed he would leave the Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE), which is a federal program, on May 29. Musk accepted the role earlier this year to curtail unnecessary federal employment and government expenditure in a systematic reduction of costs.
Musk was a special government employee with a statutory time constraint of 130 days, the term of which officially ends on May 30. He thanked President Donald Trump for giving him the assignment and trusting him to tackle a challenging duty of reforms.
Musk confessed that navigating the federal bureaucracy was much harder than he ever envisioned while getting the assignment. In his interview on May 27, he explained the political pushback and sluggish reforms made the assignment an uphill battle.
Musk also vociferously criticized a tax relief bill of trillions signed by House Republicans on May 22, cautioning against an expanding federal deficit.
Musk faces Lawsuit over DOGE actions
DOGE boasts of helping to save $175 billion ever since President Trump took office on January 20. Yet this is merely 8.5% of the target Musk initially set to save the federal budget by $2 trillion.
Of course, he later set his target at $150 billion, which reduced the actual impact to lower than initially intended. Sources indicate that DOGE has also removed 260,000 federal employees, roughly 12% of the 2.3 million workforce.
In the meantime, 14 states in the US sued DOGE and Musk for allegedly illegally interfering with government systems in the states. According to the lawsuit, the team of Musk accessed secret information, improperly removed employees, and terminated government agency contracts without proper steps.
A federal judge has granted the suit to proceed, with grave concerns falling on the shoulders of both DOGE and Musk. In an interview on May 28, Musk confessed that he devoted too much time to politics at the cost of Tesla’s recent financial performance.
After he announced his political activity would dwindle, Tesla stock gained more than 5% in after-hours trading. Nevertheless, Tesla stock is still down 5.9% this year, with other big technology firms such as Apple and Amazon also down in 2025.
