“It begins,” Elon Musk wrote Monday night, shortly after Donald Trump’s inauguration as the 47th US President.
The billionaire’s post on his social network X referred specifically to a Trump executive order ending federal diversity, equity and inclusion mandates — a longtime bugbear of world’s richest person, who runs six companies and has railed against DEI efforts for years.
But it also doubled as a reminder of Musk’s increasingly symbiotic relationship with the president to anyone still in doubt. While the bond between Musk and Trump — two people known for ever-shifting personal and professional loyalties — may not hold forever, the show of Musk’s power was on full display at the nation’s capitol.
On Monday, Trump said Musk and his team will have office space for about 20 people in what’s been dubbed the Department of Government Efficiency, or DOGE, in reference to Musk’s favored cryptocurrency. Musk now has a White House email address, and at least four people at each federal agency will help implement the cost-cutting effort. The DOGE administrator will report to the White House Chief of Staff, according to the order.
There is also no question who is in charge. Vivek Ramaswamy, whom Trump had named to co-lead the effort with Musk, bowed out to focus on his own political career in Ohio.
Just as quickly, groups launched court challenges targeting the DOGE. A union representing hundreds of thousands of federal employees sued the Trump administration Monday claiming that DOGE violates a 1972 US law requiring checks on conflicts of interest, ideological balance and transparency for groups with a direct line to the White House.
Musk, 53, was the president’s only guest speaker during a rally Sunday night. “We’re looking forward to making a lot of changes,” Musk said during an event in which Vice President JD Vance didn’t make remarks.
The following day, as Trump was sworn in at the US Capitol, a grinning Musk had prime seating ahead of the president’s own incoming cabinet members. Alongside billionaires like Jeff Bezos and Mark Zuckerberg, the tech magnates appeared in countless live shots of the transfer of power.
During Trump’s inaugural address, Musk beamed as Trump vowed to go to Mars——the goal that has animated Musk’s life for decades. The billionaire was spotted by CNN entering the office building adjacent to the White House as Trump attended inaugural events. He was compared to Rosa Parks by House majority leader Steve Scalise at an inauguration luncheon at the Capitol.
Before a throng of Trump supporters at Washington’s Capital One Arena on Monday afternoon, Musk then strode on stage in a fit of exuberance.
“This is what victory feels like!” said Musk, pounding his fists on the lectern as the crowd roared.
The SpaceX CEO then talked, as he often does, about Mars. “Can you imagine how awesome it will be to have American astronauts plant the flag on another planet for the first time?”
Musk’s first day in Trump’s Washington was not without controversy. During his speech at the Capitol One Arena, Musk twice put his hand over his heart and then forcefully raised it diagonally over his head in a gesture some online observers said resembled a Nazi salute. “My heart goes out to you,” he then said, bringing his hand back to his heart.
“Historian of fascism here,” wrote Ruth Ben-Ghiat, a professor of history and Italian studies at New York University, on BlueSky, in response to Musk’s gesture. “It was a Nazi salute and a very belligerent one too.”
The ADL, or Anti-Defamation League, a group founded to fight antisemitism, rejected the suggested link to the Nazi Sieg Heil: “It seems that @elonmusk made an awkward gesture in a moment of enthusiasm, not a Nazi salute, but again, we appreciate that people are on edge,” the group wrote on X. Musk quoted the post on X and wrote “Thanks guys,” alongside the crying-with-laughter emoji.
Musk didn’t respond to requests for further comment.
Critics also warned of Musk’s many potential conflicts of interest as the head of six companies including Tesla Inc., SpaceX and X, which all do business in areas regulated by the US government.
“You’re watching the unraveling of our democracy. It’s not about to happen. It is happening right now,” said Democratic Senator Chris Murphy of Connecticut on MSNBC Monday.
What Trump didn’t mention in his inaugural address was any plan to return to the Moon, which has been the focus of NASA’s Artemis program. Instead, Trump vowed to “plant the Stars and Stripes on the planet Mars.”
“Elon Musk got into this speech a commitment to go to Mars, right?” Murphy said. “There is a dispute inside the scientific community, inside the NASA as to whether we should be going to Mars or to the moon. It makes Elon Musk an even richer man if the choice is to go to Mars. He got that,” Murphy said.
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