DOGE Tired

Elon Musk has quit the Trump administration. His departure, however, was not entirely unexpected. Pundits had long speculated how long the uneasy camaraderie between two strong-willed personalities, Trump and Musk, could endure.

Musk stepped down from his position as head of the Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE), ending a six-month tenure marked by ambitious cost-cutting initiatives.

His resignation followed a public critique of Trump’s “One Big Beautiful Bill Act,” a spending package designed to usher in what the president called a new “Golden Age”. Musk raised alarms about the bill’s potential to balloon the budget deficit and compromise DOGE’s mission of reducing government waste. “A bill can be big, or it can be beautiful,” he said, “but I don’t know if it can be both.”

On X, Musk wrote: “As my scheduled time as a Special Government Employee comes to an end, I would like to thank President @realDonaldTrump for the opportunity to reduce wasteful spending.”

Musk’s time at DOGE was marred by legal challenges and pushback from several states. Simultaneously, his business ventures were under pressure and he wanted to refocus on them.

Tensions between Musk and Trump were evident, though. In a recent interview with The Washington Post, Musk voiced frustration: “DOGE is just becoming the whipping boy for everything … so, like, something bad would happen anywhere, and we would get blamed for it even if we had nothing to do with it.”

DOGEDonald TrumpElon MuskTesla CEO