As Donald Trump prepared to welcome his election victory, he hunkered down at his Mar-a-Lago resort with special guest Elon Musk. The South African billionaire is currently the richest man in the world — and he bet it all on the second Trump presidency.
In a photo Musk posted on X, the social media platform he bought for $44 billion, he huddles in conversation at a table with UFC CEO Dana White. "We have a new star, a star is born: Elon. He's an amazing guy,” Trump trumpeted in his rambling victory speech. “We were sitting together tonight. You know, he spent two weeks in Philadelphia, in different parts of Pennsylvania, campaigning."
And now it’s clear the pair are in it for the long haul. Trump has announced that the Tesla owner will lead the new Department of Government Efficiency, “working in conjunction with” former Republican presidential candidate Vivek Ramaswamy. Those familiar with Musk’s portfolio of businesses will notice that as an acronym this is DOGE, which is also the name of the crypto token money-loving Musk has promoted.
Trump said Musk and Ramaswamy will work with him and the Office of Management and Budget until July 4 2026 — yes, unnervingly that is the 250th anniversary of the signing of the Declaration of Independence.
The two are apparently tasked with driving “large scale structural reform” through the department. It’s promised they will slash rules, bureaucracy and spending throughout government, operating from the outside. The department is not yet officially recognised as a government agency.
“Threat to democracy? Nope, threat to BUREAUCRACY!!!” Musk wrote on his platform X. While Ramaswamy wrote in his own post: “We will not go quietly, @elonmusk.”
For his part, Ramaswamy ran in the 2024 Republican primary before dropping out and endorsing Trump.
Trump might have said that Musk had been campaigning for him for “two weeks” on the night of his election, but the new role for the tech billionaire is the culmination of many months of supporting Trump’s bid to become president for a second time.
Back in February, Musk (net worth: $264.7 billion, per Forbes) held secret talks with fellow billionaires where he voiced his support for Trump net worth $5.6 billion, per Forbes) and founded America Pac, a political action committee dedicated to funding the Republican candidate’s push to return to power. Initially, Musk flew under the radar, allowing his wealthy friends to publicly invest before he went public on July 1st 2024, donating $119 million in the run up to the election.
America PAC used the funding to get the vote out for Trump, sending canvassers out via subcontractors to battleground states. Musk also backed a raffle in swing states where voters who signed the America PAC petition – pledging support for free speech and gun rights – would be entered with a chance to win $1 million. And yes, Musk joined Trump at rallies in Pennsylvania, a state that has just swung Republican.
But as the new role announcement proves, Musk has not done all this for free.
As part of the “efficiency commission” he has the power to audit the federal government — the legislative, executive and judiciary branches of the US government, over which the President presides. Musk has expressed a desire to slash regulations on worker’s rights and environmental protections, and raise import tariffs. “I can’t wait. There is a lot of waste and needless regulation in government that needs to go,” Musk wrote on X.
The federal government and Musk have been at loggerheads for years. In 2018, Musk was personally fined $20 million and his company Tesla was fined another $20 million by the US Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) for allegedly misleading investors. The financial regulator also ordered him to step down as Tesla chairman. The SEC came for Musk again in 2022, after Musk failed to file paperwork relating to his takeover of Twitter.
And then there’s Space X, Musk’s rocket manufacturing and private space exploration company he founded in 2002. NASA had already contracted Space X to design the Starship, which aims to put American astronauts back on the Earth’s singular natural satellite. Musk has essentially promised Trump the moon on a stick — and more. “Elon, get those rocket ships going,” said Trump. “We want to reach Mars before the end of my term.”
It will surely be a blow for Jeff Bezos, the world’s second richest man (net worth $216.5 billion, per Forbes), who may well have hoped that blocking the Washington Post (the newspaper he bought in 2012 for $250 million) from endorsing Kamala Harris would have won his own space company Blue Origin some favour. Blue Origin executives reportedly met with Trump on the same day Bezos spiked the Harris endorsement.
Not only could Musk get his spaceships onto Mars, fulfilling his dream of off-world colonisation, he could also gain power over the Federal Aviation Authority (FAA) – another government agency that’s been annoying him. The FAA introduced a rocket launch licensing regime known as Part 450 in 2021, and Space X’s Starship programme has faced delays under it. The FAA also fined Space X $633,009 in September for violating launch licences with two of its Falcon 9 launches last year. Musk has threatened to sue.
Musk’s Space X has also been running afoul of the United States Department of Labor, which, coincidentally, is one of the branches of the federal government that Musk could be about to gain the power to audit. An investigation from Reuters found evidence for 600 violations of worker safety at Space X, including lost limbs and electrocutions, and reported Musk discouraged his workers from wearing yellow safety jackets because he hates the colour. Space X employee and retired US Marine Lonnie LeBlanc died of a head injury at the Texas facility in 2014. The US Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) fined Space X $7,000 for his death. In 2022, a Space X technician suffered a head injury that left them comatose for two months, prompting a $18,475 OSHA fine.
As the efficiency czar, Musk will have his shot at revenge.
As the 45th President, Trump was no fan of the federal government, signing executive orders that would make it easier to fire federal employees. Trump has had plenty of tangles with the legal system too, recently, having been found guilty on 34 counts of falsifying business records in New York. If Trump had lost the election, he may well have gone to prison. Now he’s set to return to the White House as America’s first convicted felon for a commander in chief - partly thanks to Musk’s backing.
It’s not just legal issues and a lust for money and power that unite Trump and Musk as billionaire businessmen. They both covet social media empires. Trump, once a Twitter addict, was permanently suspended from the platform after tweeting his support for the January 6 storming of the Capitol. He went on to set up his rival platform, Truth Social. Musk bought Twitter in 2022, rechristened it X, and used it as a platform for his pro-Trump campaign.
Trump and Musk have different if eerily similar — and troubling — personal lives.
Both are white men that grew up in the shadow of their wealthy fathers from racially divided nations. Fred Trump, who was arrested at a Klu Klux Klan rally in 1927, left a $300 million fortune when he died. Donald Trump’s niece, Mary Trump, described Fred Trump as a ““high-functioning sociopath” who left his son emotionally scarred. Musk has described his own father as “a terrible human being” for having children with his former stepdaughter. Errol Musk, who made his fortune in the emerald mining business in Apartheid era South Africa, has said he isn’t proud of his son Elon. You can see where they both got their daddy issues.
Trump and Musk both have a string of ex wives — and a deeply troubling relationship to women. Trump is a legally defined sexual predator, after an accusation of sexual assault in the Nineties from writer Jean E Carroll was upheld in civil court. Trump’s first wife, Ivana Trump, alleged her husband raped her in her 1990 divorce proceedings, before recanting in 2015 during the first Trump presidential campaign. When she died in 2022, Trump buried his ex wife at one of his golf courses.
The second Mrs Trump, Marla Maples, has backed her ex husband for President. Former and future First Lady Melania Trump is regularly accused of using body doubles to get out of having to attend events with her husband. Trump has five children by his three wives.
Musk has also been married three times, although twice to the same woman: actor Talulah Riley. In an article she penned for Marie Claire, his first wife Justine Musk painted a picture of a domineering husband. “There were warning signs. As we danced at our wedding reception, Elon told me, ‘I am the alpha in this relationship,’” she wrote. After their first son died at 10 weeks old, the couple had five more children via IVF.
Musk went on to have six more children after divorcing Justine — three with the musician Grimes and two with Shivon Zilis, who works for his company Neuralink. Grimes reportedly was unaware that Zilis was pregnant with twins while she and Elon’s surrogate was pregnant with their second child. Musk and Grimes are now engaged in a custody battle. He is reportedly obsessed with falling birth rates, to the extent that he reportedly offers his sperm up to friends and acquaintances. Musk also dated actor Amber Heard, and a new podcast series from Tortoise media alleges Musk paid private investigators to spy on Heard using drones and infrared cameras while she was away shooting on location in Australia.
Both men have proven they are rich, powerful, and entirely without morals. Now Trump is set to return to the Oval Office, with Musk by his side. With their combined influence and wealth they wield vast amounts of power over people’s lives, both on and offline. It’s the bromance from hell, and the results could be so much worse than we could of imagined.
