A private equity investor who is one of Elon Musk’s closest confidants has taken a new role in the Social Security Administration, a development that could be politically combustible given the program’s popularity with voters and Mr. Musk’s apparent intent to make major changes at the agency.
The investor, Antonio Gracias, who has served on the boards of Mr. Musk’s businesses Tesla and SpaceX, has started a job at the administration as part of the Musk-led cost-cutting effort known as the Department of Government Efficiency, according to documents seen by The New York Times and two people informed about his appointment.
Of the more than 50 people who have joined Mr. Musk in Washington, almost none have as extensive a history with him as Mr. Gracias. The men met around two decades ago and in that time, Mr. Gracias has become one of Mr. Musk’s most trusted advisers.
The involvement of such a close ally with the Social Security Administration suggests that Mr. Musk has made overhauling the agency a priority; in recent weeks, the tech billionaire has regularly talked about supposed fraud inside the system. Two weeks ago, he referred to Social Security as “the biggest Ponzi scheme of all time,” and this week he claimed that fraud in the program and other major entitlement spending was “the big one to eliminate.”
Republicans have long eyed privatization or cuts to Social Security, but have avoided following through out of fear of political blowback. Even as top Republicans argue that they simply want to strengthen the program’s finances, Democrats have spied a political opportunity in Mr. Musk’s potential shake-up at the agency.
Nine DOGE members have arrived at the Social Security Administration in recent days. They include Mr. Gracias and two other men who work at his investment firm, Valor Equity Partners — Jon Koval, a vice president on the investment team, and Payton Rehling, a data engineer — according to documents seen by The Times.
