Simon Montlake , Caitlin Babcock & Story Hinckley
As an investor, Elon Musk embraced the idea that business turnarounds require fast, drastic, and disruptive measures. Now he’s applying the same playbook to the country’s largest employer, the federal government, by seizing control of its payments system and its overseas aid department – and pushing aside civil servants who raise legal and ethical objections.
In doing so, Mr. Musk, the billionaire head of a newly minted Department of Government Efficiency, or DOGE, appears to be carrying out the mission of President Donald Trump, who has vowed to cut waste and fraud in Washington.
To President Trump’s supporters, the Silicon Valley ethos that Mr. Musk brings to overhauling taxpayer-funded institutions is why he’s needed in Washington, where a permanent political class has proved unwilling or unable to prune a bloated bureaucracy. Previous presidents, like Ronald Reagan, who vowed to pursue smaller government all failed. Mr. Reagan himself quipped in 1964, “a government bureau is the nearest thing to eternal life we’ll ever see on this earth.”
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