President Donald Trump joins ‘Sunday Morning Futures’ for an exclusive interview discussing taking back control of the Panama Canal while BlackRock invests, an update on the budget bill and DOGE cutting government waste.
President Donald Trump praised Elon Musk for opening “a lot of eyes” through DOGE’s cost-cutting mission, calling the multi-billionaire entrepreneur a “real patriot” for “paying a price” to get the job done.
“This is something that’s really not good for him, and yet he’s doing it,” Trump said in a “Sunday Morning Futures” exclusive interview that aired this week. “But he’s opened a lot of eyes.”
Musk has stood at the helm of DOGE since its inception before Trump took office on Jan. 20. Since Trump’s second term began, the SpaceX and Tesla CEO has pinpointed allegedly wasteful contracts, grants, aid and other avenues of spending and sought to eliminate major swaths of the federal workforce to streamline government function.
DOGE IS LAYING OFF THOUSANDS: WHAT IMPACT WILL IT HAVE WITH UNEMPLOYMENT AND THE ECONOMY?
Then-President-elect Donald Trump walks with Elon Musk before attending a viewing of the launch of the sixth test flight of the SpaceX Starship rocket, in Brownsville, Texas, Nov. 19, 2024 . (Brandon Bell/Pool via REUTERS TPX IMAGES OF THE DAY / Reuters)
The moves have faced considerable resistance from critics, many of whom are Democrats.
Protests have emerged at Tesla dealerships, Tesla car owners have faced vandalism, and some protesters have even targeted electric vehicle charging stations due to the controversy.
Trump, meanwhile, lauded Musk for doing, in his words, an “unbelievable” job to eliminate waste and improve efficiency.
“He’s found hundreds of billions of dollars worth of fake contracts, and I read just a tiny portion of them the other night – [things like] transgender surgery on mice…. the money they’re spending on all of this stuff. The whole thing’s a scam, and you’ll find, ultimately, that the money that they sent comes back to a lot of the people that made those deals. You’re going to find that,” he said.
DOGE CLAIMS $65B IN TOTAL ESTIMATED SAVINGS AS ‘AGENCY EFFICIENCY LEADERBOARD’ IS LAUNCHED
Tesla and SpaceX CEO Elon Musk, head of the Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE), stands as U.S. President Donald Trump (R) speaks during a Cabinet meeting at the White House on February 26, 2025 in Washington, DC. (Andrew Harnik/Getty Images / Getty Images)
“What he’s also done is made people realize how many people should be cut, because normally you go in, and you say, ‘All right, cut 4% of your workforce.’ He said, ‘Cut 50%, 60%, 70%.’ That’s a big thing.”
Trump has ordered cabinet secretaries to cooperate with DOGE on staffing, giving instructions to the agency leads to use a “scalpel” when deciding which workers will remain in their jobs.
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The Kobeissi Letter editor-in-chief Adam Kobeissi explains why streamlining government spending is a net positive on ‘Making Money.’
