Trump signs order handing Musk and DOGE more power to slash federal workforce - The new executive order forbids agencies from hiring more than one new worker for every four who leave government service. Elon Musk defended the work of the Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) alongside President Trump, who invited Musk to speak and sat at the resolute desk as the tech mogul gave a lengthy address.
“The people voted for major government reform and that’s what the people are going to get,” Musk said in response to pushback his work at DOGE has received. “That’s what democracy is all about.”
Musk also said he wants to add “commonsense controls” to government, arguing that his ideas are not “draconian.” And, when asked about personal conflicts of interest with his work overhauling the government, Musk replied, “transparency is what builds trust.”
In the first few weeks of Trump’s presidency, Musk has led an effort to dismantle federal agencies, buy out hundreds of thousands of federal workers from their jobs and take over payment systems within the Treasury Department and other agencies.
The work has sparked numerous lawsuits and pushback from Democratic lawmakers, state office holders and unions representing federal works.
Tuesday’s striking moment at the Oval Office featured the leader of the free world inviting the richest man in the world to give a defense of his goals in front of press brought in for the occasion. One of Musk’s young children pulled at his coat at times as the billionaire, wearing a black “Make America Great Again” baseball cap, argued the federal bureaucracy can’t have more power than any elected representative.
“If money is spent badly, if your taxpayer dollars are not spent in a sensible or critical manner, then that’s not okay. Your tax dollars need to be spent wisely, on things that matter,” Musk said, defending the goal of DOGE.
As examples of waste, Musk mentioned that people who are 150 years old, so are “probably dead,” are receiving Social Security checks and that bureaucrats with a salary of “a few $100,000” have “somehow managed to accrue tens of millions of dollars in net worth.” He said that happened with U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID) employees, suggesting they “got wealthy at the taxpayers’ expense.”
Musk offered no specific evidence to back up these allegations.
The president said that he thought it was “crazy” that DOGE has been able to find so much fraud and waste in the federal government, arguing “we had no idea we were going to find this much.”
Trump also said the White House is watching for if there’s a conflict of interest or lack of transparency on anything Musk is working on, noting that he is “a big businessman” doing this work.
Music: Groovtastic by Dhruva Aliman - Amazon - https://amzn.to/2B9tGa7 - Apple - https://music.apple.com/us/artist/dhruva-aliman/363563637- Spotify - https://open.spotify.com/artist/5XiFCr9iBKE6Cupltgnlet -
“The people voted for major government reform and that’s what the people are going to get,” Musk said in response to pushback his work at DOGE has received. “That’s what democracy is all about.”
Musk also said he wants to add “commonsense controls” to government, arguing that his ideas are not “draconian.” And, when asked about personal conflicts of interest with his work overhauling the government, Musk replied, “transparency is what builds trust.”
In the first few weeks of Trump’s presidency, Musk has led an effort to dismantle federal agencies, buy out hundreds of thousands of federal workers from their jobs and take over payment systems within the Treasury Department and other agencies.
The work has sparked numerous lawsuits and pushback from Democratic lawmakers, state office holders and unions representing federal works.
Tuesday’s striking moment at the Oval Office featured the leader of the free world inviting the richest man in the world to give a defense of his goals in front of press brought in for the occasion. One of Musk’s young children pulled at his coat at times as the billionaire, wearing a black “Make America Great Again” baseball cap, argued the federal bureaucracy can’t have more power than any elected representative.
“If money is spent badly, if your taxpayer dollars are not spent in a sensible or critical manner, then that’s not okay. Your tax dollars need to be spent wisely, on things that matter,” Musk said, defending the goal of DOGE.
As examples of waste, Musk mentioned that people who are 150 years old, so are “probably dead,” are receiving Social Security checks and that bureaucrats with a salary of “a few $100,000” have “somehow managed to accrue tens of millions of dollars in net worth.” He said that happened with U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID) employees, suggesting they “got wealthy at the taxpayers’ expense.”
Musk offered no specific evidence to back up these allegations.
The president said that he thought it was “crazy” that DOGE has been able to find so much fraud and waste in the federal government, arguing “we had no idea we were going to find this much.”
Trump also said the White House is watching for if there’s a conflict of interest or lack of transparency on anything Musk is working on, noting that he is “a big businessman” doing this work.
Music: Groovtastic by Dhruva Aliman - Amazon - https://amzn.to/2B9tGa7 - Apple - https://music.apple.com/us/artist/dhruva-aliman/363563637- Spotify - https://open.spotify.com/artist/5XiFCr9iBKE6Cupltgnlet -
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NewsTranscript
00:00X, are you okay?
00:02This is X.
00:04And he's a great guy.
00:06High IQ.
00:08He's a high IQ individual.
00:12So thank you very much.
00:14We had a busy day today. The king just left.
00:16And we've had a great discussion.
00:18Terrific discussion.
00:20Concerning Gaza
00:22and everything else.
00:24We had discussions
00:26also about Saturday
00:28at 12 o'clock.
00:30It's going to be a big moment. We'll see what happens.
00:32I don't expect much happening with these people.
00:34But we'll see what happens.
00:36And we're going to be
00:38signing a very important
00:40deal today.
00:42It's Doge. And I'm going to ask
00:44Elon to tell you a little bit about it.
00:46And some of the things that we found
00:48which are shocking.
00:50Billions and billions of dollars in
00:52waste, fraud, and abuse.
00:54And I think
00:56it's very important. And that's one of the reasons
00:58I got elected. I said, we're going to do that.
01:00Nobody had any idea it was that bad,
01:02that sick, and that corrupt.
01:04And it seems hard to believe that
01:06judges want to try and stop us from
01:08looking for corruption, especially when
01:10we found hundreds of millions
01:12of dollars worth, much more than that,
01:14in just a short period of time.
01:16We want to weed out the corruption.
01:18And it seems hard to believe that a
01:20judge could say, we don't want you to do that.
01:22So maybe
01:24we have to look at the judges,
01:26because I think it's a very
01:28serious violation.
01:30I'll ask Elon
01:32Musk to say a few words
01:34and we'll take
01:36some questions. Elon, go ahead.
01:38Sure. So
01:40the
01:42at a high level, if you say, what is the goal
01:44of Doge and
01:46I think a significant part of
01:48the presidency is to restore
01:50democracy.
01:52This may seem like, well,
01:54are we in a democracy? Well, if you don't
01:56have a feedback loop,
01:58if you...
02:00Sorry.
02:02Gravitas can be difficult sometimes.
02:04So
02:06if
02:08there's not a good feedback loop from the people
02:10to the government,
02:12and if you have
02:14rule of the bureaucrat,
02:16if the bureaucracy is in charge,
02:18then what meaning does democracy
02:20actually have?
02:22If the people cannot vote
02:24and have their will be decided by
02:26their elected representatives
02:28in the form of the President
02:30and the Senate and the House,
02:32then we don't live in a democracy, we live in a
02:34bureaucracy.
02:36So it's incredibly important that we close that feedback loop,
02:38we fix that feedback loop,
02:40and that the public, the public's
02:42elected representatives,
02:44the President, the House and the Senate,
02:46decide what happens, as opposed to
02:48a large, unelected bureaucracy.
02:50This is not to say that there aren't some good...
02:52There are good people who
02:54are in the federal bureaucracy,
02:56but you can't have an
02:58autonomous federal bureaucracy.
03:00You have to have one that is responsive to the
03:02people. That's the whole point
03:04of a democracy.
03:06And so
03:08if you asked
03:10the founders today and said,
03:12what do you think of the way things have turned out?
03:14Well, we have this unelected
03:16fourth, unconstitutional
03:18branch of government, which
03:20is the bureaucracy, which has
03:22in a lot of ways, currently, more power
03:24than any elected representative.
03:26And this is
03:28not something that people want.
03:30And it's not...
03:32It does not match the will of the people.
03:34So it's just something we've got to
03:36fix. And we've also got to address
03:38the deficit. So we've got
03:40a $2 trillion deficit.
03:42And if we don't do something about this
03:44deficit, the country's going bankrupt.
03:46I mean, it's really astounding
03:48that the
03:50interest payments alone
03:52on national debt exceed the
03:54Defense Department budget.
03:56Which is shocking, because we've got a lot...
03:58We spend a lot of money on defense.
04:00And if that just keeps
04:02going, we're essentially going to bankrupt the country.
04:04So what I really want to say is
04:06it's not optional for us to
04:08reduce the federal expenses.
04:10It's essential.
04:12It's essential for America to remain
04:14solvent as a country.
04:16And it's essential for America to have
04:18the resources necessary to provide things
04:20to its citizens, and not simply be servicing
04:22vast amounts of debt.
04:24And also, could you mention some of
04:26the things that your team has
04:28found, some of the crazy
04:30numbers, including the woman that
04:32walked away with about $30 million?
04:34Right. Well, we
04:36do find it sort of rather odd
04:38that there are quite
04:40a few people
04:42in the bureaucracy
04:44who have
04:46ostensibly a salary of a few
04:48hundred thousand dollars, but somehow manage to accrue
04:50tens of millions of dollars in net worth
04:52while they are in that
04:54position, which is
04:56what happened at USAID. We're just curious
04:58as to where it came from. Maybe they're
05:00very good at investing, in which case
05:02we should take their investment advice, perhaps.
05:04But
05:06there seems to be, mysteriously,
05:08they get wealthy. We don't know why.
05:10Where does it come from?
05:12And I think the reality
05:14is that they're getting wealthier to taxpayer expense.
05:16That's the honest truth of it.
05:18So,
05:20you know, we're looking at,
05:22say,
05:24just, if you look
05:26at, say, Treasury, for example,
05:28basic controls that
05:30should be in place, that are
05:32in place in any company,
05:34such as making sure that any given payment
05:36has a payment categorization code,
05:38that there is a comment field that describes
05:40the payment, and that
05:42if a payment is on the do not pay list,
05:44that you don't actually pay it.
05:46None of those things are true currently.
05:48So the reason that
05:50departments can't pass audits
05:52is because the payments don't have a
05:54categorization code. It's like just a
05:56massive number of blank checks just flying out the building.
05:58So you can't reconcile blank checks.
06:00You've got comment fields
06:02that are also blank, so you don't know why the payment was made.
06:04And then we've got this
06:06truly absurd, a do not pay list,
06:08which can take up to a year
06:10for an organization to get on a do not
06:12pay list.
06:14And we're talking about terrorist
06:16organizations, we're talking about
06:18known fraudsters, known
06:20aspects of waste, known things that do not
06:22match any congressional appropriation, can
06:24take up to a year to get on the list,
06:26and even once on the list, the list is not used.
06:28It's
06:30mind-blowing.
06:32So what we're talking about here,
06:34we're really just talking about adding
06:36common sense controls that should
06:38be present
06:40that haven't been present.
06:42So you say, well, how could such a thing arise?
06:44That seems crazy.
06:46When you understand that
06:48really everything is geared towards
06:50complaint minimization,
06:52then you understand
06:54the motivations. So if people receive
06:56money, they don't complain, obviously.
06:58But if people don't
07:00receive money, they do complain.
07:02And the fraudsters complain
07:04the loudest and the fastest.
07:06So
07:08then when you understand that, then it
07:10makes sense. Oh, that's why
07:12everything just, they approve all the
07:14payments at Treasury. Because
07:16if you approve all the payments, you don't
07:18get complaints.
07:20But now we're saying that, no, actually
07:22we are going to complain. If money
07:24is spent badly, if your taxpayer dollars
07:26are not spent in a sensible and
07:28frugal manner, then that's not okay.
07:30Your tax dollars
07:32need to be spent wisely
07:34on things that matter to the people.
07:36I mean, these things
07:38are just common sense.
07:40It's not
07:42draconian or radical,
07:44I think. It's really just saying,
07:46let's look at each of these expenditures
07:48and say, is this actually in the
07:50best interest of the people? And if it is, it's
07:52proved. If it's not, we should think about it.
07:54So
07:56there's crazy
07:58things like just cursory
08:00examination of Social Security,
08:02and we've got people in there that are 150 years
08:04old. Now, do you know
08:06anyone that's 150? I don't.
08:08Okay. They should
08:10be on the Guinness Book of World Records. They're messing out.
08:12So
08:14that's a case where
08:16I think they're probably dead. It's my guess.
08:18Or they should be very famous.
08:20One of the two.
08:22And then there's a whole bunch of
08:24Social Security payments where there's no
08:26identifying information. Why is
08:28there no identifying information?
08:30Obviously, we want to make sure
08:32that people who deserve
08:34to receive Social Security do receive it.
08:36And that they receive it
08:38quickly and accurately.
08:40Also, another crazy thing.
08:42So, you know, one of the things
08:44is we are trying to sort of right-size
08:46the federal bureaucracy, just make sure that
08:48there needs to be a lot of people
08:50working for the federal government, but not as many as currently.
08:52So we're saying, well, okay,
08:54if people can retire
08:56with full benefits
08:58and everything, that would be good. They can retire.
09:00Get their retirement payments, everything.
09:02And then we're told, this is actually, I think, a great
09:04anecdote, because we're told
09:06the most number of people that could retire possibly
09:08in a month is 10,000.
09:10We're like, well, why is that?
09:12Well, because
09:14all the retirement paperwork
09:16is manual on paper.
09:18It's manually calculated, then written down on a piece
09:20of paper. Then it goes down
09:22a mine. And we're like, what do you mean a mine?
09:24Like, yeah, there's a limestone mine
09:26where we store all the
09:28retirement paperwork.
09:30And you look at a picture
09:32of this mine. We'll post some pictures afterwards.
09:34And this mine looks like something
09:36out of the 50s because it was started
09:38in 1955.
09:40It's like a time warp.
09:42And then the speed,
09:44the limiting factor is the speed at which
09:46the mine shaft elevator can move
09:48determines how many people can
09:50retire from the federal
09:52government.
09:54And the elevator breaks down sometimes
09:56and nobody can retire.
09:58Doesn't that sound crazy?
10:00There's like a thousand people
10:02that work on this. So I think
10:04if we take those people and say, you know what,
10:06instead of working in a mine shaft
10:08and carrying manila
10:10envelopes to
10:12boxes in a mine shaft,
10:14you could do practically anything else.
10:16And you would add to the
10:18goods and services of the United States
10:20in a more useful way.
10:22So,
10:24anyway, so I think
10:26that's an example.
10:28At a high level, how do we increase prosperity
10:30is we get people to
10:32shift from roles that are
10:34low to negative productivity to
10:36high productivity roles.
10:38And so we increase the total output of goods and services
10:40which means that there's a higher standard
10:42of living available for everyone.
10:44That's the actual goal.
10:46Everyone's very
10:48quiet, by the way.
10:50Nobody is quiet?
10:52You're detractors, Mr. Musk,
10:54including a lot of Democrats.
10:56I have detractors?
10:58You do, sir. I don't believe it.
11:00Say that you're orchestrating a hostile
11:02takeover of government and doing it
11:04in a non-transparent way.
11:06What's your response to that criticism?
11:08Well, first of all,
11:10you couldn't ask for a stronger
11:12mandate from the public.
11:14The public voted.
11:16We have
11:18a majority of the public voting for
11:20President Trump.
11:22We've won the House. We've won the Senate.
11:26The people voted
11:28for major government reform.
11:30There should be no doubt about that.
11:32That was on the campaign.
11:34The President spoke about that at
11:36every rally. The people voted for
11:38major government reform, and that's what
11:40people are going to get. They're going to get what they voted for.
11:42A lot of times,
11:44people don't get what they voted
11:46for, but in this presidency,
11:48they are going to get what they voted for.
11:50That's what democracy is all about.
11:54Mr. Musk, the White House says that you will identify
11:56and excuse yourself from any
11:58conflicts of interest that you may have.
12:00Does that mean that you are, in effect,
12:02policing yourself? What are the checks and
12:04balances that are in place to ensure that there is
12:06accountability and transparency?
12:08We actually are trying
12:10to be as transparent as possible. In fact,
12:12we post our actions
12:14to the Doge handle
12:16on X and to
12:18the Doge website.
12:20All of our actions are maximally transparent.
12:22In fact, I don't think there's been...
12:24I don't know of a case where
12:26an organization has been more transparent
12:28than the Doge organization.
12:32The kind of things we're doing
12:34are, I think, very simple
12:36and basic.
12:38What I mentioned, for example, about
12:40Treasury, just making sure that
12:42payments that go out, taxpayer money that goes out,
12:44is categorized correctly,
12:46that the payment is explained,
12:48that organizations
12:50on the Do Not Pay list, which
12:52takes a lot to get there, actually are not
12:54paid, which currently they are paid.
12:56These are not
12:58individual judgment decisions.
13:00These are about simply having sensible checks and
13:02balances in the system itself to ensure
13:04that taxpayer money is spent well.
13:06So it's got nothing to do with, say, a contract
13:08for some company of mine at all.
13:10But if there is a conflict of interest
13:12when it comes to you yourself, for instance,
13:14you've received billions of dollars
13:16in federal contracts, when it comes to
13:18the Pentagon, for instance, which the President,
13:20I know, has directed you to look into.
13:22Are you policing yourself in that?
13:24Is there any sort of accountability
13:26check and balance in place that would
13:28provide any transparency for the American people?
13:30Well, all of our actions
13:32are fully public.
13:34So if you see anything, you say, like, wait a second,
13:36hey, Elon, that seems like
13:38maybe there's a conflict
13:40there. It's not like people
13:42are going to be shy about saying that. They'll say it immediately.
13:44Including you yourself.
13:46Yes.
13:48Transparency is what builds trust.
13:50Not simply somebody asserting trust.
13:52Not somebody saying they're trustworthy.
13:54But transparency, so you can see everything
13:56that's going on. And then you can see,
13:58am I doing something that benefits one of my companies
14:00or not? It's totally obvious.
14:02And if we thought that, we would
14:04not let him do that segment
14:06or look in that area. If we thought
14:08there was a lack of
14:10transparency or a conflict of interest.
14:12And we watch that also.
14:14He's a big businessman.
14:16He's a successful guy. That's why we want
14:18him doing this. We don't want
14:20an unsuccessful guy doing this.
14:22Now, one thing also
14:24that Elon hasn't really mentioned
14:26are the groups of people
14:28that are getting some of these payments.
14:30They're ridiculous. And we're talking
14:32about billions of dollars that we've already found.
14:34We found fraud
14:36and abuse.
14:38I would say those two words as opposed to
14:40the third word that I usually use. But in this
14:42case, fraud and abuse.
14:44It's abusive because
14:46most of these things
14:48are virtually made up or
14:50certainly money shouldn't be sent to them.
14:52And you know what I'm talking about. It's
14:54crazy.
14:56But we're talking about
14:58tens of billions of dollars
15:00that we've already found.
15:02And now a judge who's an activist
15:04judge
15:06wants to try and stop us from
15:08doing this. Why would they want to do that?
15:10I campaigned on this. I campaigned on the fact
15:12that I said government is corrupt.
15:14And it is very corrupt.
15:16It's also
15:18foolish.
15:20As an example, a man has a contract for
15:22three months and
15:24the contract ends, but they keep paying him for the next
15:2620 years because nobody ends a contract.
15:28You get a lot of that. You have a contract
15:30that's a three-month contract.
15:32Now normally, if you're
15:34in a small... In all fairness,
15:36it's the size of this thing is so big.
15:38But if you have a
15:40contract and you're in a regular
15:42business, you end the contract in three months.
15:44It's a consultant.
15:46Here's a contract for three months,
15:48but it goes on for 20 years.
15:50And the guy doesn't say that he got money
15:52for 20 years. They don't say it.
15:54They just keep getting checks month after month.
15:56And you have various things like that.
15:58And even much worse than that.
16:00Actually, much worse.
16:02And I guess you call that incompetence, maybe.
16:04It could be corruption. It could be deals made
16:06on both sides.
16:08You gotta get some money.
16:10I think there's a lot of kickback here.
16:12I see a lot of kickback here.
16:14Tremendous kickback. Because nobody could be so stupid
16:16to give out some of these contracts.
16:18So he has to get a kickback.
16:20So that's what I got
16:22elected for.
16:24That and borders and military.
16:26A lot of things. But this is a big part of it.
16:28And I hope that
16:30the court system is going to
16:32allow us to do what we have to do.
16:34We got elected to, among other things,
16:36find all of this
16:38fraud, abuse, all of this
16:40horrible stuff going on.
16:42And we've already found billions of dollars.
16:44Not like a little bit. Billions.
16:46Many billions of dollars.
16:48And when you get
16:50down to it, it's going to be
16:52probably close to a trillion dollars.
16:54It could be close to a trillion dollars that we're
16:56going to find. That will have
16:58quite an impact on the budget.
17:00And you'll
17:02go to a judge where they handpick a judge
17:04and he has certain leanings.
17:06I'm not knocking anybody for that.
17:08But he has certain leanings.
17:10And he wants us to stop looking.
17:12How do you stop looking?
17:14I mean, we've already found it.
17:16There's a case in New York where
17:18a hotel has paid $59 million.
17:20$59 million because
17:22it's housing
17:24migrants. Illegal migrants.
17:26All illegal, I believe.
17:28And they were being paid twice the normal room rate
17:30at 100% occupancy. Unbelievable.
17:32So it's a racket.
17:34If I may,
17:36just going for the President's
17:38comments.
17:40At a high level,
17:42how
17:44what are the two ingredients
17:46that are really necessary in order to
17:48cut the budget deficit in half
17:50from $2 trillion to $1 trillion?
17:52And it's really two things.
17:54Competence and caring.
17:56And if you add competence
17:58and caring, you'll cut the budget deficit
18:00in half.
18:02And I fully expect to be scrutinized
18:04and get a daily
18:06proctology exam, basically.
18:08Might as well just camp out there.
18:10So it's not like I think I can get
18:12away with something. I'll be scrutinized
18:14nonstop.
18:16But with the support of the President,
18:18we can cut the budget deficit in half
18:20from $2 trillion to $1 trillion.
18:22And then with deregulation
18:24because there's a lot of
18:26regulations that don't ultimately
18:28serve the public good.
18:30We need to free the builders of America to build.
18:32And
18:34if we do that, that means you get
18:36the economic growth to be maybe
18:383%, 4%, maybe 5%.
18:40And that means if you can get a trillion dollars
18:42of economic growth and you cut the budget deficit
18:44by a trillion,
18:46between now and next year,
18:48there is no inflation.
18:50There's no inflation at 26.
18:52And if the government is not borrowing
18:54as much, it means that interest costs
18:56decline. So everyone's mortgage,
18:58their car payment, their credit card bills,
19:00their student debt,
19:02their monthly payments drop.
19:04That's a
19:06fantastic scenario
19:08for the average American.
19:10I mean, imagine
19:12they go down the grocery aisle and the prices
19:14from one year to the next
19:16are the same?
19:18And
19:20their mortgage, all their debt
19:22payments dropped?
19:24How great is that for the average American?
19:26We had no
19:28idea we were going to find
19:30this much. And it's open.
19:32It's not complicated.
19:34It's simple stuff.
19:36We can't believe it.
19:38A lot of work, a lot of smart people involved.
19:40Very, very smart people.
19:42You're talking about
19:44anywhere, maybe 500
19:46billion dollars. It's crazy
19:48the kind of numbers you're talking about.
19:50You know, normally when you're looking at something,
19:52you're looking for one out of a hundred.
19:54Here, you're almost reversing it.
19:56You look for one that's good.
19:58And you can look at the title
20:00and you say, why are we doing this?
20:02Why are we doing that? And the public gets it.
20:04You know, the public gets it. You've seen the polls.
20:06The public is saying, why are we paying
20:08all this money? This is for years
20:10this has gone on.
20:12Yeah, go ahead.
20:14Wait, go ahead.
20:15Senator Rand Paul today said that doge cuts
20:17will ultimately need a vote in Congress.
20:19Do you agree with that? Is that the plan?
20:21I really don't know. I know this.
20:23We're finding tremendous fraud
20:25and tremendous abuse.
20:27If I need a vote of Congress to find fraud
20:29and abuse, it's fine with me.
20:31I think we'll get the vote.
20:33Although there'll be some people that wouldn't vote.
20:35And how could a judge want to hold us back
20:37from finding all of this fraud
20:39and finding all of this incompetence?
20:41Why would that happen?
20:43Why would even Congress want to do that?
20:45Now, Congress, if we do need a vote,
20:47I think we'd get a very easy vote
20:49because we have a track record now.
20:51We've already found billions of dollars
20:53of abuse, incompetence,
20:55and corruption.
20:57A lot of corruption.
20:59If a judge does block one of your policies,
21:01part of your agenda, will you abide
21:03by that ruling? Will you comply?
21:05I always abide by the courts, and then I'll have to appeal it.
21:07But then what he's done is he's
21:09slowed down the momentum.
21:11And it gives crooked people more time
21:13to cover up the books.
21:15You know, if a person's crooked
21:17and they get caught, other people see that
21:19and all of a sudden it becomes harder
21:21later on. So, yeah, the answer
21:23is I always abide by the courts.
21:25Always abide by them.
21:27And we'll appeal.
21:29It does take a long time, and I would hope
21:31that a judge, if you go into a judge
21:33and you show them, here's a
21:35corrupt situation. We have a check
21:37to be sent, but we found it
21:39to be corrupt. Do you want us to
21:41send this corrupt check to a person?
21:43Or do you want us not to give it
21:45and give it back to the taxpayer?
21:47I would hope a judge would say, don't send it,
21:49give it back to the taxpayer.
21:51If I can add to that, what we're finding
21:53is that a bunch of the fraud is not even going
21:55to Americans. So I think we can all agree
21:57that if there's going to be fraud, it should at least
21:59go to Americans. But a bunch of the
22:01fraud rings that are operating in the United States
22:03and taking advantage of the federal government,
22:05especially in the entitlements programs, are actually
22:07foreign fraud rings. They're operating in other countries
22:09and actually exporting money to
22:11other countries.
22:13We should stop that.
22:15And this is big numbers.
22:17We're talking about 100 to 200 billion dollars a year.
22:19Serious money.
22:21You said on X that an example
22:23of the fraud that you
22:25have cited was
22:27$50 million of condoms were sent
22:29to Gaza. But
22:31after fact check this,
22:33apparently Gaza in Mozambique
22:35and the program was to
22:37protect them against HIV.
22:39Can you correct this statement? It wasn't
22:41sent to Hamas, actually. It was sent
22:43to Mozambique, which makes sense why condoms
22:45were sent there. And how can we
22:47make sure that all the statements that you said
22:49were correct so we can
22:51trust what you say? Well, first of all,
22:53some of the things that I say will be incorrect
22:55and should be corrected.
22:57Nobody's going to bat a thousand.
22:59We will make mistakes,
23:01but we'll act quickly to correct any mistakes.
23:07I'm not sure we should be sending $50 million
23:09worth of condoms to anywhere, frankly.
23:11I'm not sure that's something Americans
23:13would be really excited about.
23:15That is really an enormous number of condoms,
23:17if you think about it.
23:19But if it went to Mozambique
23:21instead of Gaza, I'm like, okay, that's not as bad,
23:23but still, you know, why are we doing that?
23:27Can you talk a little bit about how closely
23:29you're working with agency heads
23:31as you're directing these cuts?
23:35How much input do agency heads have
23:37when you're making these decisions?
23:39Yeah, we work closely with the agency heads.
23:45There are sort of checks in place.
23:47It's not just us going in and doing things willy-nilly.
23:49It's in partnership with the agency heads,
23:51and I check previously with the president
23:53to make sure that this is what the president
23:55wants to happen.
23:57So we talk almost every day,
23:59and I double-check things
24:01to make sure,
24:03is this something, Mr. President,
24:05you want us to do this?
24:07Then we'll do it.
24:09USAID has been one of your main targets.
24:11Are you concerned at all that some of the cuts
24:13or that shutting that agency altogether
24:15may lead to diseases
24:17or other bigger problems
24:19starting in other countries
24:21that then come to the United States?
24:23Yeah, so that's an interesting example.
24:25So that's something where we work closely
24:27with the State Department
24:29and Secretary Rubio,
24:31and we have, for example,
24:33turned on funding for Ebola prevention
24:35and for HIV prevention.
24:37You left that.
24:39Yes, correct.
24:41And we are moving fast,
24:43so we will make mistakes,
24:45but we are moving very quickly.
24:47Do you see it as a worthy cause, USAID?
24:49I think that there are some
24:51worthy things, but overall,
24:53if you say, what is the bang for the buck,
24:55I would say it was not very good.
24:57And there was far too much
24:59of what USAID was doing
25:01was influencing elections
25:03in ways that I think
25:05were dubious
25:07and do not stand the light of day.
25:09I just have a follow-up
25:11to the Pentagon contracts.
25:13The President is directing you
25:15to look into the Department of Defense.
25:17Is that a conflict of interest?
25:19Yes, which we definitely need to do
25:21and are going to do at the President's request.
25:23Does that present a conflict of interest for you?
25:25No, because you'd have to look at the individual contract
25:27and say, first of all,
25:29I'm not the one filing the contract.
25:31It's people at SpaceX or someone
25:33who will be fighting for the contract.
25:35And I'd like to say, if you see any contract
25:37where it was awarded to SpaceX
25:39and it wasn't by far the best value for money
25:41let me know.
25:43Because every one of them was.
25:45The President said the other day
25:47that you might look at Treasuries.
25:49Could you explain that a little bit?
25:51What kind of fraud,
25:53and that question goes to both of you,
25:55what kind of fraud are you expecting to see
25:57or do you see right now in U.S. Treasuries?
25:59I think you mean the Treasury Department
26:01as opposed to Treasury Bills.
26:03You also referenced Treasuries on Air Force One
26:05the other night.
26:07As I mentioned earlier,
26:09the first order of business
26:11is to make sure we're actually collecting
26:13sorry for this,
26:15although my son might enjoy this,
26:17but he's sticking his fingers in my ears.
26:19It's a bit hard to hear sometimes.
26:21Hey, it's all good.
26:23So,
26:25the stuff we're doing
26:27with Treasury Department is so basic
26:29that you can't believe
26:31it doesn't exist already.
26:33So for example,
26:35like I mentioned,
26:37when a payment goes out,
26:39it has to have a payment categorization code.
26:41It's like, what type of payment is this?
26:43You can't just leave the field blank.
26:45Currently,
26:47many times the field is left blank.
26:49And you have to describe what's the payment for.
26:51Some basic rationalization
26:53that also is left blank.
26:55So this is why the Pentagon,
26:57when's the last time the Pentagon passed an audit?
26:59A decade ago, maybe?
27:01Ever? Really?
27:03In order to actually pass audits,
27:05you have to have financial information
27:07that allows you to trace the payments.
27:09So,
27:11and once in a while,
27:13the Treasury
27:15has to pause payments
27:17if it thinks the payment is going
27:19to a fraudulent organization.
27:21Like,
27:23if a company
27:25or organization is on a
27:27do not pay list, we should not pay it.
27:29I'm sure you would agree.
27:31Like, if it's quite hard to get on that payment,
27:33it means that this is someone
27:35that is like
27:37dead people, terrorists,
27:39known fraudsters,
27:41that kind of thing.
27:43We should not pay them.
27:45But currently we do.
27:47Which is crazy.
27:49We should stop that.
27:51And by the way, hundreds,
27:53thousands of transactions like that.
27:55You know, we have a big team.
27:57And
27:59for the sake of the country,
28:01I hope that the person that's in charge
28:03and the other people that report
28:05to me that are in charge
28:07are allowed to do the right thing.
28:09Namely, make sure everything's honest,
28:11legitimate, and competent.
28:13But we're looking at just
28:15when you look at USAID,
28:17that's one.
28:19We're going to look at the military, we're going to look at education.
28:21They're much bigger areas.
28:23But the USAID
28:25is really corrupt.
28:27It's corrupt. It's incompetent,
28:29it's really corrupt.
28:31And I can't imagine a judge saying,
28:33well, it may be corrupt, but you don't have the right.
28:35You got elected to look over the country
28:37and to, as we say,
28:39make America great again, but you don't have the right
28:41to go and look and see whether or not
28:43things are right that they're paying
28:45or that things are honest that they're paying.
28:47And nobody can even believe this.
28:49Other people, law professors,
28:51they've been saying,
28:53how can you take that person's right away?
28:55He's supposed to be running the country,
28:57he's not allowed to look at who they're paying it to
28:59and what they're paying.
29:01We have massive amounts of fraud
29:03that we caught. I think we probably
29:05caught way over
29:07a lot of billions of dollars already
29:09in, what, two weeks?
29:11And it's going to go
29:13to numbers that you're not going to believe.
29:15And as I said, much is
29:17incompetence and much is dishonesty.
29:19We have to catch it. And the only way we're going to
29:21catch it is to look for it. And if a judge
29:23is going to say you're not allowed to look for it,
29:25that's pretty sad
29:27for our country. I don't understand how
29:29it could even work.
29:31Can you personally guarantee that
29:33the buyout program, the offer to
29:35federal workers, can you personally
29:37guarantee that the workers who opt in to resign
29:39now will be paid through September?
29:41They'll get their money, but they're getting a good deal.
29:43They're getting a big buyout.
29:45And what we're trying to do is reduce government.
29:47We have too many people. We have office space.
29:49It's occupied by 4%.
29:51Nobody's showing up to work
29:53because they were told not to.
29:55And then Biden gave them a five-year pass,
29:57some of them, 48,000 of them,
29:59gave them a five-year pass, that for
30:01five years, you don't have to show up to work.
30:03And let me tell you,
30:05this is largely, much of this stuff is
30:07because of Biden. It's his fault.
30:09He allowed this country,
30:11what he did on our border.
30:13What he did on our border is almost not as bad
30:15as what he did with
30:17all of these contracts that have come out.
30:19It's a very sad day
30:21when we look at it. I can't even
30:23believe it. But many contracts just
30:25extend, and they just keep extending,
30:27and there was nobody there to correct it.
30:29And that cannot be,
30:31I can't imagine that could be held up
30:33by the court. Any court that would
30:35say that the president or his
30:37representatives, like
30:39Secretary of the Treasury, Secretary of State,
30:41whatever, doesn't have the right
30:43to go over their books and make sure everything's
30:45honest. I mean, how can you
30:47have a country, you can't have anything that way.
30:49You can't have a business that way, you can't have a country
30:51that way. Hey, thank you very much, everybody.
31:01Mark Zuckerberg will be at the White House
31:03tonight at about 10 o'clock. If you want to come
31:05over, you can say hello to him.
31:09Not much. No.
31:11They were very nice. We were treated very
31:13nicely by Russia, actually.
31:15I hope that's the beginning of
31:17a relationship where we can end that
31:19war and millions of people
31:21can stop being killed. They've lost
31:23millions of people. They lost,
31:25in terms of soldiers, probably
31:271.5 million soldiers
31:29in a short period of time.
31:31We gotta stop that war.
31:33And I'm interested primarily
31:35from the standpoint of death.
31:37We're losing all those soldiers.
31:39And they're not American soldiers, they're Ukrainian
31:41and Russian soldiers.
31:43But you're probably talking about a million and a half.
31:45I think we gotta bring that one
31:47to an end. Okay?
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