Tech Billionaire Elon Musk and the Department of Government Efficiency, or DOGE, have been at the center of controversy over the last few weeks, with questions being raised about Musk’s role in the department and the overall power both he and the department hold.
Advisors and departments dedicated to government efficiency are not new for a sitting president, dating back to Andrew Jackson’s “kitchen cabinets” and the Clinton-Gore National Partnership for Reinventing Government.
The difference between Elon Musk and the DOGE, according to WKU professor Jeff Budziak, is Musk’s economic and pop cultural status.
“Obviously, Elon Musk is independently famous and is also the richest man in America, the richest man in the world, so those really do distinguish this in quite a way,” according to Buziak.
“The other way, at least the first couple of weeks have distinguished the Musk case is that most advisors, and there’s all kinds of government rules and regulations that restrict this kind of stuff, don’t have not been given the seemingly independent authority to act the way that Elon Musk has seemingly been given authority to.”
Furthermore, with DOGE’s leadership currently unclear, the department is unsure of what it can do, which has resulted in the recent court cases.
“I believe the most politically contentious issue is how engaged President Donald Trump is on these issues. Is Elon Musk able to make these decisions unilaterally? “President Trump can say, ‘Oh, yeah, it’s all fine with me,’ but that’s not the level of oversight that we’re used to,” Budziak says.
Ultimately, Budziak stated that Musk does not necessarily have the authority to make these decisions, but rather the permission.
“Musk has no authority to operate independent of the president’s prerogatives, but I think there are ongoing difficult legal questions about how much can President Trump delegate to him, to allow him to do,” he says. “There’s all kinds of rules.”
With DOGE and Trump’s second presidency still in its early stages, Budziak believes there is a chance things will become more regulated and clear, but the public has the right to be concerned.
“When you do these massive shutdowns of government expenditures or government resources, most people are going to like that idea in concept,” according to Budziak.
“But there will be a constituency that suffers greatly as a result of this. If you do it enough times, you may end up having a negative impact on all constituencies.”
On our WBKO Facebook page, we asked viewers, “Do you believe Musk and DOGE’s decisions are positively impacting the political landscape?”.
Reactions were mixed, with some claiming Musk is ending bureaucratic overspending and adding much-needed oversight, while others expressed concerns about Musk’s intentions and overall knowledge of audits.
