Elon Musk is looking back on his time steering the Trump administration’s federal workforce cuts, and by his own account, he went a bit too far.
The billionaire, who poured millions of dollars into helping Donald Trump win back the White House, made the admission during a wide-ranging sit down with The Economist’s Zanny Minton Beddoes, published this week.
Musk didn’t mince words about his time at the helm of the Department of Government Efficiency.
“I think I got a little too involved in politics, got carried away, frankly,” he told Minton Beddoes, reflecting on his stint as a special government employee.
Trump handed Musk the DOGE role just days after his 2024 election win, pairing him with former GOP presidential candidate Vivek Ramaswamy to lead the effort until the agency’s unofficial deadline of July 4.
Ramaswamy exited not long after the launch, leaving Musk solely in charge of an ambitious and ultimately unsuccessful push to cut $2 trillion from the federal budget through deep reductions to agency funding and staffing.
The Fallout From the Cuts
Those cuts didn’t come without consequences.
They triggered protests across the country and a wave of lawsuits tied to mass layoffs of federal workers, along with cuts to research programs and health and safety initiatives.
Musk defended the broader mission behind the effort.
“The goal with the sort of DOGE stuff was to try to do something about the deficit, which is massive,” he said, acknowledging that the initiative brought him significant criticism.
Musk Pushes Back on USAID Fallout Claims
The interview also touched on the human cost of DOGE’s decision to dismantle the U.S.
Agency for International Development.
When asked about reports connecting the cuts to a rise in terrorism activity in sub-Saharan Africa, as well as public health data suggesting children have died abroad due to the loss of USAID’s nutrition and medical programs, Musk rejected the claims outright, calling them false.
From DOGE to Reconciliation With Trump
Musk’s run with DOGE came to an end in May 2025 when his 130 day term limit as a special government employee expired.
His departure coincided with a public falling out with Trump over the president’s signature tax and spending bill.
Since then, Musk has indicated that he and Trump have patched things up.
