The President-elect of the United States, Donald J. Trump, announced the appointment of entrepreneur Elon Musk as “Minister of Government Effectiveness”. His roadmap? Find two trillion dollars (so 2,000 billion dollars) in savings, in an annual federal budget which includes 6.5 trillion. Or 30% off.
And he knows his way around public money. Because according to the calculations of New York Times , over the past decade, its companies (X, Tesla, SpaceX, etc.) have signed contracts worth $16 billion with 17 different federal agencies. He pushed his sense of self-promotion so far as to name his future administration, DOGE, to Department of governement efficiency, in reference to DOGECOIN the cryptocurrency he financed. And whose price exploded upon the announcement of its designation.
It is therefore a question of monitoring how the administration, and possibly the magistrates, will assess the cases of conflicts of interest which will undoubtedly arise between CEO Musk and the public official that he is preparing to become. Especially since several federal administrations, which he aims to restructure, are currently conducting investigations into the commercial practices of his companies.
A very political entrepreneur
Until now, we knew the principle of rewarding major donors to an electoral campaign who were given the post of ambassador of the United States by the new President.
Elon Musk already participated on November 8, 2024 in a telephone conversation between Donald Trump and Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky. In spring 2022, the entrepreneur invited himself into this conflict by moving the Starlink constellation above Ukraine, at the request of a Ukrainian minister, in order to allow the besieged president to communicate with his troops in the countries and to send video appeals to Western leaders and public opinion.
Thus making it possible for Volodymyr Zelensky to speak at the Cannes Film Festival, before the French National Assembly, the Israeli Knesset, the German Bundestag or the MEDEF Summer University, the captain of industry then took on a very policy.
A ministerial position on fixed-term contract
Donald Trump has set a symbolic deadline. Since it must have achieved its large-scale savings objective, by July 4, 2026, the National Day, when the United States will celebrate 250 years of the Declaration of Independence.
If he was able to dismiss in a few days nearly 80% of the employees of Twitter which became X due to undemanding labor laws, the situation is different for federal civil servants, who have a more protective status.
Even if he can count on the support of Donald Trump who, in October 2020, had already signed a presidential decree creating “Schedule F”. This calls into question the employment of a state agent, who would be considered insufficiently efficient.
An industrialist obsessed with savings
Elon Musk undoubtedly has successes under his belt. For example, Space X, founded in 2002, which manufactures and launches spacecraft. This company allowed the United States to no longer depend on Russia for sending its astronauts. And it initiated a revolution in the space industry, with a drastic reduction in the cost of launches, made possible by the recovery and reuse of certain launcher elements.
The same goes for automobile manufacturing: his interventions on production lines to reduce the number of bolts and his revisions to the software of the screwdrivers used for assembling parts are part of the legend of the entrepreneurial engineer. A very personal involvement which does not make us forget that accident rates at Tesla are 30% higher than the industry average.
Contested methods
Its libertarian approach, which leads for example to limiting the regulation of content published online to the bare minimum, leaves a field of expression for supporters of fake news to the detriment of the sourced information. On November 13, 2024, the British daily The Guardian announces that it will no longer publish content on the X platform.
At the same time in France, press companies (Le Figarothe group’s titles The World, Les Echos–The ParisianAFP) are suing X, accusing the social network of exploiting their publications without paying them.
