The budget cuts implemented by United States President Donald Trump will have no limits—at least, that’s what he made clear this Friday with evident pride. He has even floated the idea of completely eliminating the Department of Education and subjecting the Pentagon to a full-scale audit. No budget is safe, and no government employee has job security.
Democratic criticism of Elon Musk’s alleged excessive influence in the White House seems to have no effect on Trump. The president openly defended the billionaire, who is leading the cost-cutting initiative, and made it clear that all decisions go through him. “Cuts only happen if I order them,” Trump declared. When asked about the latest Time magazine cover, which depicts Musk sitting at the Resolute Desk in the Oval Office, Trump shrugged, smirked, and dismissed it with, “I didn’t even know Time was still around. What a surprise.”
The president expressed satisfaction with the ongoing cuts, which include the virtual dismantling of the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID) and layoffs at the National Institutes of Health and the Environmental Protection Agency. According to him, the unnecessary spending uncovered and the inefficiency exposed are “historic.”
“We’re talking about billions, trillions of dollars wasted—maybe illegally, I’d even say criminally. I’m very proud of these young people’s work. They’re doing it because I told them to. Maybe it would be easier to stay out of this, but it has to be done—it’s necessary,” Trump said.
Trump also defended Musk amid a brief scandal that rocked his team. A young engineer involved in the ambitious budget-cutting plan was fired after it was revealed that he had anonymously posted racist messages on social media, stating that white people should only marry within their race and that people of other races should be expelled from the country.
Despite the controversy, neither Trump nor his vice president, J.D. Vance, considered the matter particularly serious. In fact, both publicly suggested that Musk reconsider the decision and give the engineer another chance—if he showed remorse.
Musk, for his part, has described his work in Washington as the “Second American Revolution”, though he remains largely out of the public eye aside from his social media activity. He does not work out of the West Wing but has instead set up his operations in the Vice President’s building, occupying the former War Department offices alongside a team of young engineers.
These engineers and entrepreneurs close to Musk have gained unprecedented access to classified government systems and data, raising alarms among federal employees, lawmakers, and senators. The so-called Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE)—whose acronym coincidentally matches that of a well-known cryptocurrency—boasts of having reduced public spending by $1 billion per day. However, it faces mounting criticism over the potential impact of these cuts on essential services. For Trump, however, these savings are cause for celebration.
Meanwhile, with no real opposition—not even in Congress—Trump continues to accelerate budget cuts and uphold his incentivized resignation program for two million federal employees. A judge is set to rule on the measure Monday following a lawsuit filed last week in Boston.
