Summary
Elon Musk, co-head of the Department of Government Efficiency under Donald Trump’s advisory team, revised his claim of finding $2 trillion in federal budget cuts to a “best-case outcome” of $1 trillion.
Musk’s earlier target, dismissed as unrealistic by experts, had included the entire discretionary budget of $1.7 trillion.
While Musk and co-lead Vivek Ramaswamy plan to recommend cuts, specifics remain unclear.
Experts warn savings may require targeting mandatory programs like Medicaid, potentially causing hardships.
“Savings” they will find:
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any agencies that monitor, counteract or release reports on Putin and Russian activity
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agencies that regulate electric vehicle production or road safety
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Agencies that regulate space flight and aerial pollution
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The NLRB, OSHA and whichever agencies work to oppose child labor
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agencies that regulate pharmaceutical pump and dump schemes
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agencies that regulate emerald mines
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The CFPB
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agencies that monitor ethics among government employees
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agencies that regulate recreational ketamine, ritalin and cocaine use
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child protective services and agencies that intervene in spousal abuse
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anecdotes that certify or otherwise support divorce attorneys
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agencies that originate, maintain and enforce restraining orders
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agencies that track and publish flight information to enable safer travel between all of the aircraft simultaneously in the sky.
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agencies that allow for the creation, distribution and use of rape kits (yes, even though there’s a backlog. You’re very clever)
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Agencies that keep a database of all people with small, odd shaped penises that no longer get hard…
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$2 Trillion was more than the discretionary budget of the US. It literally couldn’t be done.
Which is why it was a stupid promise and literally anyone with any expertise could tell you that. Which shows you how unserious Musk is about this.
Now that he cut the promise in half and it’s still politically impossible but not literally impossible, I reiterate my request…say how you plan to do it. Give us a rough idea what programs are being cut, even the easiest 20%.
By having the conversation about the number alone, we’re buying his political premise. The money is not there for no reason, these are democratically popular government programs, that’s why they exist. So which popular programs are you getting rid of to save this money?
As an Ontarian I feel we are actually more than a few years from America in terms of this bullshit.
You can go back to when Rob Ford won the mayorship of Toronto talking about “stopping the gravy train”. He found no gravy.
Fast forward to Doug Ford becoming premier to “stop the gravy train” of which he found no gravy. In fact he unlawfully terminated numerous contracts costing Ontarians even more money.
Short story, people who try to reduce complex economic issues into simple solutions are snake oil salesmen not to be trusted.
Unfortunately in today’s media landscape it works.
No, this is bit Elon Musk being unserious, this is musk just lying his ass off as he does all day, every day, since forever.
When you start looking into his history you’ll find a pattern of continuous lies and deceits. Everything great he is known for either actually never happened (self driving cars, anyone? Any day now he’ll have them, forover a decade already) or is something that someone else did and he just took the credit.
He won’t “find” 2 trillion dollars. He won’t find a single trillion dollar either, he won’t find much, in the end.
This is just typical Elon Musk behavior as he knows that the musk fans will remember those 2 trillion dollars, they’ll forgetbot completely ignore reality
You could probably save a bit by getting rid of the department of government efficiency…
If they go after Medicaid or Medicare it might bring more attention to how fucked up insurance is for Americans. I don’t want them to be empowered to make any suggestions, but this might just bring a tense situation to a head.
That’s what we said about COVID and absolutely nothing improved fundamentally.
Yeah, it is sad. I am slightly more hopeful now after the UHC CEO was killed, and a lot of normal people started talking about their bad experiences with insurance companies. I won’t hold my breath for a revolutionary change, but fingers crossed.
Likely because he refuses to put his own stuff under that microscope
of course you can’t you stupid fuck.
fucking troglodyte pretends he’s iron man when he can’t do basic arithmetic.
Come on, give him a break. Those are some big numbers! It’s not like just anybody could have figured out that 2 trillion was more than the entire 1.7 trillion discretionary budget. It takes a genius to figure out this stuff, a real genius like Elon “I’m a good dad” Musk, who is a stable genius and definitely was not an illegal immigrant at any point.
Can we take a moment to acknowledge a few billionaires made their own government department, and people are just rolling with it?
They’re a random private company. Why are we just letting that fact slide???
Because the media is owned by that same billionaire class
Man who lies endlessly caught lying again. More at 7.
Seriously what an unexpected outcome…
The one trillion difference needs to be paid back from his salary and a potential salary claw back for this underperformance.
I think he isn’t getting a salary, apart from whatever gains he reaps by removing roadblocks for his companies.
Elon is such a dumbass.
Edit: I’m sorry, *President Elon is such a dumbass.
People made a big deal about Michelle Obama missing Jimmy Carter’s funeral. Why wasn’t President Elon there? Hmmm. Why isn’t that being covered?
I want to join truth social just to call out “president Elon”
And Trump won’t bring down grocery prices. I really wish Americans were smarter. It’s going to be a rough ride. At least I’m not going to have to subscribe to the NYT to see the obituary that I want to.
It’ll be 2 million, and way less than the amount the DOGE department manages to embezzle itself.
Yeah, the only real “cuts” will be to regulatory agencies that get in the way of his business plans.
Wherever he cut, you can safely assume it will only hit the people at the bottom, not those at the top.
It will hit whatever annoys him, his companies and that extends to everybody who kisses his ring sufficiently.
But yes, social and worker protections probably match that criteria.
Whatever supports his companies
i’m actually kind of shocked he admitted this. isn’t his usual strategy to promise super unrealistic things, not deliver, and then make the same promise the next year?
Indeed, but I bet he isn’t used to hide things in the public. This is a federal budget, not yet another of his corporations. I bet he knows the very best accountants but that’s just different.
If he cuts anything it’ll be support for middle class and poor people and itll be jack shit, it will fuck everything up and it will be touted by clowns as a success.
Anyone who actually believed they would find $2 trillion was an idiot, the rest of us knew they’d just cut the things they hate, bump the subsidies that favor them and their friends, and call it a day.
I expect them to privatize and then somehow claim they cut the budget because they are paying a private company instead of running whole departments themselves (govt)
Your comment will age poorly when Trump’s tarrifs lead to a collapsing economy and he prints money like mad to solve it, resulting in hyper-inflation letting President Musk keep his election promise.
Wondering how that connects as I didn’t mention tarrifs?
After hyperinflation, Musk will easily cut $100T from the budget, making your claim that only an idiot would believe he could find $2T in cuts laughable.
Aha, well played!
Makes me glad I don’t hold dollars.
Yeah maybe it’s time to buy some gold
Gold is a good option, and I have some, but I also have some Monero.
Starts thinking of all his old pc equipment How much gold is in this stuff
Not much
The funny thing is…it’s not like their voters would care if they lied. They could literally say “We cut the budget by $17 trillion by making sure the trans kids don’t get surgeries!” And their voters would fucking cheer.
They wouldn’t look deep enough to actually care what they cut.
So the question is why even make this announcement? I’m guessing it’s a distraction from something else.
Surely it’s essy to find $2tr in the Homeland Security/ military budget?
Not even there. DoD is ~$840B and DHS another sixty. Not even one trillion in the entire US security apparatus, but they were going to so easily find twice that. It was always pure nonsense.
