For most of the 17-minute interview, Elon Musk stuck to a script. He was just a tech guy on a mission to “eliminate waste and fraud” from government.
His slash-and-burn cost-cutting crusade was making “good progress actually”, he told Fox Business commentator Larry Kudlow on Monday, despite sparking a backlash that has reverberated far beyond Washington.
“Really I just don’t want America to go bankrupt,” he said.
But then Kudlow asked Musk to look forward. Would the so-called “department of government efficiency” (Doge) still be in place in a year? He thought so – his assignment wasn’t quite complete. Musk, the world’s richest man, then pointed to social security, a widely popular federal program that provides monthly benefits to retirees and people with disabilities, and other social safety net programs: “Most of the federal spending is entitlements. That’s the big one to eliminate.”
For weeks, Donald Trump and Republicans have insisted that social security, Medicaid or Medicare would not “be touched”. Now Musk was suggesting the programs would be a primary target. Almost as soon as the words left his mouth, Democrats pounced.
“The average social security recipient in this country receives $65 a day. They have to survive on $65 a day. But you want to take a chainsaw to social security, when Elon Musk and his tens of billions of dollars of government contracts essentially makes at least $8m a day from the taxpayers,” Hakeem Jeffries, the US House minority leader, said in a floor speech the following day. “If you want to uncover waste, fraud or abuse, start there.”
As the second Trump era comes into focus, Democrats have found a new villain: an “unelected billionaire” whose bravado – and sinking popularity – they believe may offer their party a path out of the political wilderness.
“There’s nowhere in America where it is popular to cut disease research, to gut Medicaid and to turn off social security,” said Jesse Ferguson, a Democratic strategist. “So it’s hard to see a place where what Musk is doing for Trump doesn’t become an albatross for Republicans.”
The White House has championed Doge’s work while reiterating that Trump would “protect” social security and other entitlement programs. Musk did not respond to a request for comment.
Despite mounting criticism of Musk, the president has embraced his beleaguered ally, who spent close to $300m helping elect him to the White House. This week, Trump hailed Musk as a “patriot” as he showcased Teslas from the south lawn of the White House. The president selected a red sedan, hoping to boost the electric car company, which has suffered a sharp decline in sales and stock prices since its chief executive launched his Doge operation. The White House has said that if conflicts of interest arise, “Elon will excuse himself from those contracts”.
But Musk and his chainsaw-wielding approach to downsizing government is playing a starring role in early Democratic ads and fundraising appeals. Progressive activists have staged “nobody elected Elon” protests across the country while other groups are targeting Tesla showrooms and dealerships. On a “fighting oligarchy” tour across the country, Senator Bernie Sanders pointed to Musk’s growing political influence as a central threat to American democracy.
“Most American people, they can’t name us. They don’t know who Chuck Schumer is, but they do know what this administration and Elon Musk and the GOP are planning for them,” Katherine Clark, the House minority whip, said on Friday. “It’s why you’re seeing this uproar in town halls.”
While Democrats have much to say about Musk, they are less sure of how to stop him.
Many of Doge’s actions have been halted or stopped in the courts. This week two federal judges ordered government agencies to rehire tens of thousands of probationary employees who were fired as part of Doge’s purge of the federal workforce.
Locked out of power in Washington, Democrats are under enormous pressure to use any leverage they have to block Trump and Musk.A Republican-authored bill to fund federal agencies through separate and avert a shutdown fiercely divided Democrats this week. House Democrats and progressive activists erupted in anger at Chuck Schumer, the Senate minority leader, who ultimately relented and helped pass the measure rather than risk a funding lapse and, in his words, give Musk and Doge an opportunity to “exploit the crisis for maximum destruction”.
Public polling underlines Democrats’ interest in Musk. A new CNN survey found that just 35% of Americans held a positive view of the billionaire Trump advisor, a full 10 percentage points lower than the president. The poll also found that he is notably better known and more unpopular than the vice-president, JD Vance.
More than six in 10 Americans said Musk had neither the right experience nor the judgement to carry out a unilateral overhaul of the federal government, though views broke sharply along partisan lines. Roughly the same share said they were worried the reductions would go “too far”, resulting in the loss of critical government programs.
A survey conducted by the left-leaning Navigator Research late last month found that views of Doge as a standalone cost-cutting initiative were marginally favorable, in line with other polls that have found Americans are broadly supportive of its stated mission to root out waste and improve efficiency. But there are signs Americans don’t like the approach or implementation so far.
When the effort was framed as “Elon Musk’s Doge,” views turned sharply more negative. The poll also captured the far-reaching impact of the cuts: 20% say they or someone they know has lost access to a federal service; 19% say they or someone they know have lost access to a federal grant and 17% say they or someone they know has quit or been laid off from a federal government job.
“Musk is the face of everything that people are worried about in the Trump administration,” Ferguson said, adding: “To a lot of people, putting Elon Musk in charge of protecting the middle class is like putting Jeffrey Dahmer in charge of protecting a morgue.”
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Democrats believe Musk’s comments on entitlement programs are particularly potent – the world’s wealthiest man advocating for steep cuts to programs designed to help retirees and vulnerable Americans.
In the Fox Business interview, Musk claimed the programs were rife with waste and fraud, suggesting as much as $600bn to $700bn – or nearly a quarter of their budget – could to be cut. Federal watchdogs have long identified improper spending as a problem, but Musk’s figure exceeds their estimates.
Musk has derided social security as “the biggest Ponzi scheme of all time”. As evidence of widespread fraud, Musk repeated a debunked theory, favored by Trump, that social security benefits are being paid to dead centenarians. The head of the agency has rejected the premise. Democrats have warned that Trump and Musk were using false or exaggerated claims of fraud as a “prelude” to slash the program or privatize it, as many conservatives have long desired.
After Musk’s comments aired, the White House swiftly issued a “fact check” insisting that Musk had only advocated for eliminating waste and highlighted several occasions in which Trump has vowed to protect Americans’ benefits.
Republicans also rushed to clarify Musk’s comments. “Look, Elon Musk is a brainiac with an IQ that I cannot even fathom. He is not a master of artful language,” Mark Alford, a Republican representative of Missouri, said on CNN. “We are not going to eliminate social security, Medicare and Medicaid. That’s sheer nonsense.”
It was a rare break with Musk, whom Republicans have been loath to cross, well aware that he not only has the president’s full support and ear but a fortune to squash any dissent within the ranks. During Trump’s address to Congress earlier this month, Republicans gave Musk a standing ovation as the president heaped praise on his work. They publicly warn that Democrats oppose Musk’s fraud-and-waste removal efforts at their own political peril.
Yet there are signs that Republicans are beginning to worry. House Republicans have reportedly been advised not to hold in-person town halls after several widely publicized confrontations with constituents furious over loss of government jobs and services. And despite Trump’s close alliance with Musk, even he seemed to indicate it was time to reign him in. “We say the ‘scalpel’ rather than the ‘hatchet,’” the president wrote in a social media post.
Republicans are weighing deep cuts to entitlement programs as a way to offset the cost of extending Trump’s sweeping tax cuts aimed largely at the wealthy. Trump has praised the House plan.
“The Republican Party at this point has wrapped both arms around the third rail and is holding on as the electricity flows,” said Ben Wikler, the chair of the Democratic party in Wisconsin, where a contest next month will provide an early test of the party’s anti-Musk strategy.
On Thursday night, Wikler hosted a People v Musk grassroots event to discuss the billionaire’s impact on the 1 April state supreme court race, which will determine the balance of power between conservative and liberal justices on Wisconsin’s highest bench. Musk has spent millions of dollars through his America Pac, in an effort to tip the scales in favor of Brad Schimel, a county judge and former Republican attorney general. Democrats are supporting Susan Crawford, a county judge and former attorney for Planned Parenthood.
Wikler said Musk’s ascendancy in Washington – and his influence in the race – has turned liberal voters in the state from “concerned to panicked to outraged with the heat of that 1,000 suns”.
“If Susan Crawford wins this race, and Musk and Schimel lose,” he said, “then that will be a big bat signal in the sky to Democrats everywhere that fighting back is not only the right thing to do, it’s good politics.”
