And we're going to be signing a very important deal today.
It's DOGE, and I'm going to ask Elon to tell you a little bit about it. Acolytes of Elon Musk, working in the Department of Government Efficiency are currently gutting the US government, with Elon Musk claiming he'll find savings of up to two trillion dollars the deficit.
So we've got a two twellion dollars deficit and if we don't do something about this deficit, country's going bankrupt.
Department by department, DOGE staff, mostly young men from the tech world, are sacking federal workers and gaining access to some of the government's most sensitive information. Victoria Elliott is a reporter for Wired covering platforms and power. She's been tracking the Silicon Valley figures for reshaping the US government and finding out what it means for the future of her country. From Schwartz Media, I'm Daniel James. This is seven am. It's Monday, March seventeen, and this is part
one of a two part interview Victory. You've been following the workings of the Department of Government Efficiency al Maustage as it's been gutting the US government. Can you paint me a picture of what's been happening.
Yeah, I mean, first things first, is that what we think of as DOGE used to be the US Digital Service, and when Trump was inaugurated, he transformed that into a new thing, the US Doage Service.
We want to get it done.
This is an order creating and implementing the Department of Governmental Efficiency known as DOGE.
Okay, that's a big one.
And then within that they created a temporary organization which gives them the ability to hire special government employees. So those are people brought in unlimited term contracts, generally for around one hundred and thirty days, and they not subject to the same transparency requirements as regular government employees, and sort of the expectation is that they're there for a limited duration that can be paid or unpaid, and then
you know they'll leave. And what it means is that you sort of have this whole group mostly made up of what appear to be special government employees, going from agency to agency, starting with the Office of Personnel Management the PM, which is sort of the HR service of the government, and the General Services Administration, which handles things like its properties and it's it and moving from there out into these other agencies accessing their data as these
organizations are also being asked to reduce their manpower by the Trump administration.
Right, so, who are these DOGE staffers that are being brought in and who are the exactly made? Where are I from? And how have I recruited?
So initially with the sort of DOGE strikeforce that we first saw, we were really looking at people who were connected to Silicon Valley, oftentimes through Musk. So for instance, Thomas shed who's at GSA, he worked for Tesla. The engineers that we found at the Federal Aviation Administration, they came from SpaceX. And then you have some of these younger guys who were twenty five and under. Some of
them came from other tech companies. These young engineers were reportedly hand picked by Elon Musk, and the oldest is just twenty five years old, and some of them are reportedly still in college. Seems like a recent high school graduate is determining whether.
Career civil servants have sufficiently justified their jobs.
And Elon Musk has helping him. Mrs Young as nineteen years old. They're very smart, located, they're like you.
They're very smart thing. Others of them came from interning with SpaceX, another from Pallenteer, which is run by Peter Teel, who is a close Musk ally. He runs Palenteer, which is a big a company that has billions of dollars
in government contracts, particularly with the military. And then outside of Musk and his companies and the companies of his allies, we're also seeing, you know, now as things have progressed, more and more lawyers who are sort of more traditionally Trump alined, people like people from the Heritage Foundation, which is a conservative think tank, you know, people who are
backed by those entities. So DOUGE is technical staff, and then on top of that, what we're now seeing is sort of an expansion of its legal heft.
Talk to me about the excess that these staff as have been receiving to do this task of cutting government waste, as the administration would put it.
Yeah, So what we do know is that they are getting into very sensitive systems. And so, for instance, at the Treasury, we knew that one of the DOGE members, Marco Ales, had access to really sensitive payment systems and Treasury for those who are not in the US, you know that controls like you know, getting your tax refunds
Social Security. We're looking at about six trillion dollars worth of payments process through that system every year, and ultimately, like having someone in that system means they could have theoretically turned that off.
We also have some breaking news this morning. We've talked earlier in the show about USAID. It's uncertain fate. We've just confirmed an email went out early this morning to staff saying do not come in. Headquarters will be closed this morning. You have to work remotely where and Elon Musk is saying in his face is last night so that Donald Trump agreed with him to shut down the entire agency.
One of the big things that you know, we can already see is with USAID. You know, that is an agency that is created by and funded by Congress, that's already been determined, people have voted on, and that's what our budget is for. And the idea that DOGE could go in basically shut off payments for that and shutter the agency that has manifold effects and that changes people's lives.
There are people in other parts of the world who will not receive medicine, will not receive food because the US is not sending money that it had promised to.
Send coming up after the break. Job cuts won't save a trillion dollars? So what else is in the firing line? Hi?
Ruby Jones. Here, seven Am tells stories that need to be told. Our journalism is founded on trust and independence, and now we're increasing our coverage. Every Saturday until the election, will bring you an extra episode to break down the biggest political moments of the week. If you enjoy seven Am, the best way you can support us is by making a contribution at seven am podcast dot com dot you for slash support. Thanks for listening and supporting our work.
Let's talk about the wave of government layoffs and cuts that have been undertaged as part of this DOGE project. What have we seen so far in terms of cuts to employees and government layoffs.
Well, we've seen a lot of riffs production enforces. All the agencies were required to send in riff plans for how they're going to cut staff. So even if the riff hasn't happened yet, there are major plans to cut
staffing in government. And then of course we saw the buyout offer, which you know told people you know, if you agree to take a buyout, you'll get paid through September, et cetera, which is I think particularly difficult because that's something that Musk also did when he took over Twitter, and as it turned out, a lot of former Twitter employees had to fight tooth and nail for that agreement
to be honored after they left. And then on top of that, you know, we're seeing thousands and thousands of federal workers leave because this is demoralizing because even if they are maybe not being targeted right now with reductions, they don't want to work in this environment or they feel,
you know, morally uncomfortable working in this environment. So I think we're seeing a massive reduction in the federal workforce at a rate that we probably haven't seen, at least not that I can remember in my lifetime.
So Himes will tripping the headcamt site because Dige is promising the cut one, potentially two trillion dollars from the federal budget, and where else will Dodge fond the sightings that they're promising.
Well, here's the thing. Two trillion dollars is more than the entire discretionary budget in twenty twenty three, and by that I mean the budget ballparks around seven trillion dollars, and most of that is locked in. It is entitlement spending, so Medicare, Medicaid, social Security, it's interest on debt, and
some of its military spending. Everything else, whether that's USAID, the Department of Energy, or the National Institutes of Health, every other government service is in that one point seven trillion of discretionary funds. So initially Musk said they were going to try and put two trillion. It's now down to one trillion. But even then, you're not going to get into that without doing things like cutting social Security,
cutting retired people's benefits. And there's a reason that Musk has now recently sort of started floating language around how maybe those sort of benefits need to be curtailed.
Which is most of the federal spending is entitlements. So that's like the big one to eliminate is that that's the sort of half trillion, maybe sixcess seven hundred.
Billion a year.
A thing that I think a lot about is, you know, Musc will go on Twitter and be like, oh, we were spending five million dollars on you know, insert name of project. That sounds really stupid or wasteful right, five million dollars, But five million dollars compared to seven trillion dollars is nothing. Foreign aid, for instance, constitutes less than one percent of the US budget, less than one percent.
It's like going to the airport with an overstuffed bag and when they tell you I'm so sorry your bag is overweight, you say, I'll just take out my underwear. It will make no difference. You will still pay that overcharge fee and you will not have underwear. Giving people the raw numbers in that way is misleading, because of course, any normal American who makes sixty five thousand dollars a year is going to think wasting five million dollars on
some country that they've never been to feel stupid. But you know, for someone like Musk, who is a centi billionaire who has hundreds of billions of dollars, even for him, five million dollars is nothing. He could say, he could fund that whole program. So I think it's really misleading, and I think that's all sort of part of the game.
This is part one of that interview with WAD reporter Victoria Elliott. In part two, we find out the reel end game for Doje and Ela Musk.
Musk has spent several years talking about how quote unquote unelected bureaucrats are the problem. But for someone like Musk and many other people in Silicon Valley many other rich people, those unelected bureaucrats are also the people that enforce rules. They tack them, they investigate them when their companies do something wrong. Musk and people like him benefit from these agencies being gutted, specifically because they no longer have the power to keep businesses like his in check.
Part two is in your feed right now. Look for what happens to America if DODE succeeds. I'm Daniel James. This is seven am. Thanks for listening.