Elon Musk's misreading of President Donald Trump's motivations could lead to his downfall sooner rather than later, according to a new article in Politico.
Trump appointed Musk to head up the new Department of Government Efficiency, or DOGE, with a mandate of cutting as much pork out of the federal budget as possible. But Musk is going about his new job all wrong, argues senior political columnist Jonathan Martin, by "attempting to do to the federal workforce what he did to Twitter" — laying down the law and threatening employees to comply with his big cost-cutting ideas or face the consequences.
In a recent memo to federal workers, Musk gave nearly the same message he did to Twitter employees when he took over the company in 2022: commit to "excellence," and be “reliable, loyal, trustworthy,” or get out of Dodge.
Musk's strategy doesn't take into effect his new boss' desire for the dramatic, however. "The president is eager for big, beautiful wins and press coverage of the same — not some conservative ideological project to shrink the federal workforce," Martin writes.
He continues, "What Musk, and Trump’s ideologue appointees, should also grasp is that the president may say he supports cutting government workers or programs, but he doesn’t really mean it. The moment such efforts prompt anger from congressional Republicans, GOP governors or, again, a wave of bad coverage, Trump will disavow what Musk thought was his mandate. Remember this: The only true meaning of Trumpism is Trump winning."
Sharing Trump's philosophical view on slimming the federal government isn't the same thing as putting a plan into action, Martin argues. It's the same mistake made by Republican lawmakers who've tried to implement what they thought were Trump's objectives, only to find out they had miscalculated.
"I don’t doubt that Trump — who’s been obsessive about getting federal employees back to the office five days a week — is broadly supportive of rooting out waste and inefficiency. At least in theory," Martin writes.
"But tread carefully. Your political moonlighting will only last so long as you recognize what actually drives Trump. And if you think its government efficiency, well, somebody I know has a casino on Mars he wants to sell you. Tick-tock."
