Elon Musk says he is leaving the Donald Trump administration
after four months as head of the department of government efficiency (DOGE).
Musk announced his decision late Wednesday evening, thanking
Trump for the opportunity to reduce wasteful spending.
The Tesla CEO said DOGE will, however, continue.
News of Musk stepping down caused a stir, largely because of
his close relationship with Trump.
But a retweet from the X CEO’s account stated that the
departure had not strained his friendship with the president.
“In the coming days, legacy media will try to convince you
that President Trump and Elon Musk are no longer friends and that’s why Musk
left,” the post reads.
“What they won’t tell you is that Elon was a Special
Government Employee, limited to 130 days of service and that term ends
tomorrow.”
Musk’s exit comes a day after he spoke out against a
Trump-backed spending bill. The president called it a “Big Beautiful Bill”.
In an unusual criticism of the president, the tech tycoon
said he was “disappointed to see the massive spending bill, frankly, which
increases the deficit, not just decreases it, and undermines the work that the
DOGE team is doing”.
“I think a bill can be big, or it can be beautiful, but I
don’t know if it can be both, in my personal opinion,” Musk added.
Before Trump was elected, Musk, who played a significant
role in seeing him win back the White House, pitched a government cost-cutting
initiative multiple times.
Since January 20 when Trump was inaugurated, DOGE has shrunk
11 federal agencies, forcing about 250,000 federal workers out of their jobs.
The agency also claimed to have saved taxpayers $160
billion. Its promise was to save $2 trillion.
A budget model designed by the University of Pennsylvania
which tracks weekly treasury data showed that the US government has spent more
than it did during the same period last year.
Trump has yet to publicly react to Musk’s departure, marking
another bump in the tumultuous relationship between the two-time American
president and the world’s richest man.
Musk heavily criticised Trump during his first term.
In recent times, their relationship morphed into a rapid
friendship.
A few months earlier, the billionaire tech entrepreneur said
he loved Trump as much as a straight man can love another man.
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