Musk calls Doge only ‘somewhat successful’ and says he would not do it again
Elon Musk has said the aggressive federal job-cutting program he headed early in Donald Trump’s second term, known as the “department of government efficiency” (Doge), was only “a little bit successful” and he would not lead the project again.Musk said he wouldn’t want to repeat the exercise, talking on the podcast hosted by Katie Miller, a rightwing personality with a rising profile who was a Doge adviser and who is married to Stephen Miller, Donald Trump’s hardline anti-immigration deputy chief of staff.Asked whether Doge had achieved what he’d hoped, Musk said: “We were a little bit successful.We were somewhat successful.”Doge created chaos and distress in the government machine in Washington DC, and by May more than 200,000 federal workers had been laid off and roughly 75,000 had accepted buyouts as a result of purges by Musk’s external team of often-young zealots.
The group said it had saved billions of dollars in public expenditure, but it was impossible for experts to authenticate these claims because of the lack of public accounting,It was estimated to have saved far less public money than Musk and Trump boasted it would,Musk eventually stepped back from Doge and later the team appeared quietly to have been wound down,Musk, the CEO of electric vehicle company Tesla, who also controls social media platform X and runs aerospace company SpaceX, said to Miller that he would “have been better off running his companies” than Doge,In a series of circumspect responses to Miller’s questions, the Tesla founder pondered the outcome if he had not taken on the Doge role or expressed as much political rhetoric.
Musk was widely criticized by voices on left for taking a wrecking-ball to government institutions as part of the Trump agenda to allow for greater bureaucratic efficiency, working off a script provided by the Heritage Foundation’s controversial Project 2025.He indicated the Doge taskforce was ideologically opposed to liberal initiatives such as refugee services and transgender rights.However on Tuesday’s podcast he told Miller: “I think instead of doing Doge, I would have basically worked on my companies.And they wouldn’t have been burning the cars,” Musk said, referring to outbreaks of vandalism after Musk took on the role.After an incident in Oregon in March when shots were fired at a Tesla dealership, police said they were aware that dealerships had been “targeted across Oregon and the nation for political reasons”.
Tesla’s shares lost close to half their value between January, when Doge was initiated, and March, but have since recovered.The billionaire’s SpaceX company is expected to raise more than $25bn through an initial public offering next year, a move that could boost the rocket-maker’s valuation to over $1tn.During the podcast, Musk said was unbowed by his time as a special government employee, despite the falling out and online flame-war with Trump after he exited the role in late May.“I wouldn’t say I was super illusioned to begin with,” he said.Last month, Doge was formally disbanded with eight months left to its mandate.
In February, Musk held a chainsaw aloft at a conservative conference to symbolize efforts to cut billions from the $7tn federal budget.Musk told Miller: “We stopped a lot of funding that really just made no sense, that was just entirely wasteful.”But asked if he would go back and do it again, however, he said: “No, I don’t think so.Knowing what I know now.”
Jimmy Kimmel on Trump: ‘What a child he is’
Late-night hosts dug into Donald Trump’s back-pedaling over footage of the controversial Venezuela boat strikes and a White House UFC fight for his 80th birthday.On Jimmy Kimmel Live!, the host checked in on the US president’s economy talk, as he once again condemned use of the word “affordability”:“The reason he’s out talking about the economy is that he wants to convince us that it’s good, which it isn’t,” Kimmel explained. “But we also don’t know how bad it is because we stopped reporting job numbers. It’s like if the NBA just stopped keeping score. ‘We won
Jon Stewart on Fifa’s peace prize: ‘An entirely fictitious golden butt plug’
Late-night hosts mocked Donald Trump for gleefully accepting the inaugural Fifa peace prize ahead of the World Cup in the US.On the daily show on Monday evening Jon Stewart roasted Donald Trump for accepting the inaugural Fifa peace prize at the World Cup draw on Friday. “Oh my God, he won the prize specifically created to appease him!” he joked. “The Fifa appease prize!“I don’t know if you guys got a good look at the trophy, but come on,” he laughed before a photo of the trophy, sculpted to appear as though several hands rising from below cupped the world.“I think its design somewhat reflects, in all likelihood, how it was conceived
Joyful, irreverent, endlessly quotable: why Hunt for the Wilderpeople is the perfect holiday movie
Picking a Christmas movie is hard work. It needs to be suitable for the entire family, which rules out Die Hard, and entertaining for the whole family, which rules out It’s a Wonderful Life. It has to be good, which rules out Love Actually, and it has to suit distracted viewing, which rules out Muppet Christmas Carol, of which it’s a sin to miss a single second.There is, however, no rule that says Christmas movies must include Christmas. Which is why Taika Waititi’s Hunt for the Wilderpeople is the perfect Christmas movie
‘True activism has to cost you something’: Bridgerton’s Nicola Coughlan on politics, paparazzi and parasocial fandom
Back in 2008, when Nicola Coughlan was at drama school, a guy in her class swaggered over and, with all the brimming confidence of young men in the noughties, asked her, “Do the Irish think the English are really cool?” Coughlan, born in Galway, mimes processing the question. “Well,” she said, “it’s quite complicated. Like, there’s a lot of history there, between the two countries. Like, there’s a lot going on.”The Guardian’s journalism is independent
A minimalist statement or just Pantonedeaf? ‘Cloud dancer’ shade of white named Pantone’s 2026 colour of the year
Hi, Emma! I’m so pumped to find out what colour 2026 is going to be. Fill me in!Brace yourself, Nick. Every year since 1999 Pantone chooses a colour for the year, a representation of the zeitgeist – from how we’re feeling to what we’re wearing, how we’re styling our homes and even our eyebrows. Last year’s was the darker shade of beige “mocha mousse”, the year before that was the soft, warm “peach fuzz”.This year’s pick is even more baffling
Jimmy Kimmel on the Trump administration: ‘They have better-quality cabinets at Ikea’
Late-night hosts tore into Donald Trump’s five-hour Truth Social posting spree and his inability to stay awake during cabinet meetings.Jimmy Kimmel wasted no time in returning to his favorite target – Donald Trump – on Tuesday evening. “I know I’ve said this before, but for real this time: he went completely off the rails last night,” the host began. “The man who is allegedly running the country banged out an onslaught of posts and reposts in a furious social media blitzkrieg that started at 7.09pm, went nonstop until almost midnight
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