Before you get hot and bothered, I am a fan of Musk…. I have been in the position he was in and he did an amazing job and I believe his goal of 2 trillion dollars is probably achievable. But government is a different story and a different animal. It bites back.
Tech mega billionaire Elon Musk has officially stepped back from his role as a “special government employee” within the so-called Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE).
He arrived in Washington with an initial goal of slashing $2 trillion from the federal government and to root out waste, fraud and abuse (that was later lowered to $1 trillion). Now, looking back, what has DOGE accomplished? Here are stats to know:
💰 $175 billion: DOGE’s estimate for overall savings. This is far below the trillion-dollar cuts Musk sought, and reporting from multiple news outlets over the past few months have suggested the cuts have been overestimated, citing accounting errors and other issues.
🪓 58,000+: The number of job cuts from DOGE. There has been no official tally, but a New York Times analysis estimated at least 58,000, plus roughly 76,000 government employees who took buyouts.The newspaper cited another roughly 150,000 planned reductions.
⬇️ -14.4: Musk’s net favorability rating, according to the Silver Bulletin’s average.
⚖️ 28: The number of lawsuits relating to DOGE, per The New York Times’s tracker of lawsuits against Trump’s agenda.
🧑💻 70 employees: The number of people who have been identified as being involved in DOGE. There has been no official list or tally, though.
📉 14.5 percent: The percentage that Tesla stock has *decreased* since Inauguration Day. Tesla stock has been fairly volatile since Musk began his role within the federal government, but they’ve steadily risen since Musk announced his upcoming departure at the end of April.📈 28 percent: The percentage that Tesla stock has actually *increased* since Election Day 2024. CNBC’s Tesla stock tracker
Musk thanked President Trump on Wednesday night, posting his farewell on X. “The @DOGE mission will only strengthen over time as it becomes a way of life throughout the government,” he said.
But Musk left with a parting gift: Yesterday morning, he bashed Republicans’ mammoth bill to advance Trump’s legislative agenda, arguing it phases out Biden’s low-carbon energy tax credits too quickly.
Read the Tesla Energy post that Musk reposted.
Cate Martel