Elon Musk and the Trump administration parted ways a little over a month ago and, since then, the Tesla billionaire and the president have been locked in a war of words over Trump’s One Big Beautiful Bill, which Musk views as harmful to his business interests. Despite Elon’s dramatic departure from the government, many of his minions are still employed by the White House via the Tesla mogul’s DOGE initiative. Now, officials are worried those DOGE stooges may still be taking orders from those close to Musk.
The Wall Street Journal reports that some Trump officials have expressed concerns over the continued presence of DOGE officials with ties to Musk. In particular, they’ve expressed anxiety over the continued influence of Steve Davis, a longtime Musk hatchet man and one of the former top lieutenants at DOGE. Davis has worked for Musk for years (including in positions at X and SpaceX), and, since he left his post with DOGE, has remained in communication with many of its staffers, the newspaper reports. Davis “often communicates with them over Signal, and sometimes calls certain staffers multiple times a week,” sources told the Journal. Early last month, DOGE staffers were informed at a meeting that while Davis was “out of government,” he is “not out of DOGE.”
The Journal further notes the ambiguous tenor of the relationship between DOGE and the rest of the government, as the group’s mission becomes increasingly unclear:
Some current and former DOGE officials say allies of Musk want to finish the work they started and usher in a DOGE 2.0 focused more on revamping government websites and information-technology systems than cutting government workers. But others, including some inside the White House, say they believe Musk and Davis are keeping tentacles in government to help their businesses.
If the breakup between Musk and the president really is as acrimonious as it has been portrayed publicly, it’s somewhat mystifying that the administration continues to employ officials with ties to the billionaire. Still, last we checked, it isn’t just Davis who is still (allegedly) involved. DOGE continues to be filled with people with connections to the Tesla CEO. In June, ProPublica reported that over 100 workers with ties to Musk remained at the cost-cutting agency. At least 38 of those officials have worked directly for businesses owned by Musk (or were currently working for him at the time of the report). As such, there’s little evidence that the administration has purged the group of the billionaire’s influence, though the Journal report notes that some DOGE officials have recently been “quizzed” on who they are loyal to, Trump or Musk.
The Journal report also notes that Musk, himself, met with many DOGE staffers not long after the blowup with Trump. The billionaire reportedly spoke with DOGE folks during a meeting on June 10th, at which he was joined by Davis and Katie Miller (Stephen Miller’s wife), who also seems to work for the billionaire in an undefined capacity. At the meeting, Musk communicated to “key DOGE employees” that he “continues to back their work, encouraging them to stay the course.” The meeting occurred approximately a week after Musk infamously accused Trump of being in the Jeffrey Epstein files.
Miller’s continued involvement with Musk is also bizarre, given the fact that her husband is Trump’s deputy chief of staff, one of the highest-ranking officials in the government. Stephen Miller is credited with running large parts of Trump’s administration, including his draconian immigration policy and the crackdown on America’s colleges. There have been unconfirmed (and, as far as we know, completely vacuous) claims that Musk and Miller are having some sort of affair, but those rumors don’t amount to much but typical internet chatter. Again, why one of Trump’s top officials would encourage his wife to work for Musk when he is supposedly feuding with the president is unclear.
Theoretically, the Trump team doesn’t want to purge the Musk-connected workers because it would be viewed as some sort of failure for DOGE, which has been one of the administration’s most prominent initiatives. On the other hand, most of the DOGE workers don’t seem particularly qualified for the work they are doing. Many of them are former software engineers who are in their early twenties. It doesn’t seem like it would be very hard to replace most of them. DOGE has also proven deeply unpopular with a majority of Americans, so the prospect of canning the entire effort and firing everybody involved also doesn’t seem out of the question.
When questioned about the public sparring between the billionaire running the government and the billionaire running Tesla, Trump officials have opted for tight-lipped non-answers. Susie Wiles, Trump’s chief of staff very diplomatically addressed Musk’s departure from government during a recent podcast appearance. “The president was very, very kind to him, and Elon had so much to offer us,” said Wiles, during an interview with Pod Force One. “He knew things we didn’t know. He knew people and technologies that we didn’t know. It was a great thing when it was a great thing, and had a very, I think, a very troublesome ending.” When pushed about why Musk and Trump broke up the way they did, Wiles insisted: “I don’t understand it. I don’t know.”
“I enjoyed working with Elon. I think he’s a fascinating person and sees the world differently…and I think that’s probably what the president saw, too,” she added. “[He’s] just a little bit different than the average Joe, but certainly [it] came to not a good ending.”
