By Pam Martens and Russ Martens: February 13, 2025 ~

Yesterday, the newly formed House Subcommittee on Delivering on Government Efficiency (DOGE) held its first hearing titled: “The War on Waste: Stamping Out the Scourge of Improper Payments and Fraud.” The Subcommittee appears to be part of an echo chamber attempting to bring legitimacy to President Donald Trump tapping his largest campaign donor, billionaire Elon Musk, to lead an effort to gut federal law enforcement and regulatory agencies and create enough savings to give tax breaks and other perks to the ultra-rich.

Musk should be immediately disqualified from any such watchdog role for the following reasons: he effectively put Trump over the election finish line, giving $288 million to PACs or Super PACs supporting Trump; the Wall Street Journal (paywall) reported that Musk has been communicating with Russian President Vladimir Putin since 2022, notwithstanding the fact that Musk’s company SpaceX is a U.S. military defense contractor and Putin is on a U.S. sanctions list for launching a war on Ukraine.

In addition, Musk’s companies have received $19.8 billion in U.S. government contracts since 2009. (See chart above.)

And finally, and most importantly, Musk’s so-called Department of Government Efficiency (with the same acronym as the Subcommittee, i.e. DOGE, and the same name as a crypto coin Musk has boosted) is now investigating the same federal agencies whose Inspectors General were investigating Musk’s companies until they were sacked by the Trump administration last month.

Yesterday, during the DOGE Subcommittee’s first hearing, Congressman Greg Casar (D-TX) revealed that the Inspectors General of five federal agencies that were investigating Musk’s companies had been fired by the Trump administration last month. Casar said that the Inspector General of the Department of Labor had 17 open investigations into Tesla and SpaceX, where Musk is the CEO of both and a major shareholder. Casar also called out that the Inspector General of the Department of Transportation was investigating Tesla when he was fired by the Trump administration.

According to Casar, the Department of Defense’s Inspector General was looking into SpaceX when he was fired. The investigation was potentially a result of the Wall Street Journal’s reporting on Musk’s use of illegal drugs and secret conversations with Putin, both of which would be highly problematic for a defense contractor with security clearance.

Also, according to Casar, the Inspector General of the U.S. Department of Agriculture was investigating Neuralink, another Musk company (experimenting with computer brain implants) when he was fired; and the Inspector General of the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) was repeatedly “taking on” Tesla, when he was fired.

Musk’s companies currently have over $3 billion in existing contracts with the U.S. government. In that regard, Casar told the witnesses at the hearing that Musk will receive an average of $8 million a day from his companies’ contracts while the Social Security recipients that he’s investigating receive an average of $65 a day.

You can watch the Casar exchange with the hearing witnesses here.