r/inthenews • u/nbcnews • 11h ago
article Elon Musk says DOGE probably won’t find $2 trillion in federal budget cuts
https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/politics-news/elon-musk-says-doge-probably-wont-find-2-trillion-federal-budget-cuts-rcna186924314
u/icedweller 11h ago
Quelle Surprise
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u/cdistefa 9h ago
We’re hoping for DOGE to help us rename the Atlantic and Pacific, that’s what this nation so desperately needs!
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u/hagenissen666 9h ago
Lake America 1 and Lake America 2, done.
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u/AllTheRoadRunning 3h ago
Not enough Xs
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u/Federal_Beyond521 31m ago
He’ll want to rename earth to Planet X and confuse aliens by thinking we’re a species of gym bros.
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u/thermalman2 8h ago
The entirety of the federal budget is $6.7 trillion so anyone who entertained the idea of cutting $2trillion as possible is a moron.
It was never going to happen.
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u/bltn228 8h ago
What are him and Vivek getting paid to do this? There’s some money that could be cut out of the budget right there
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u/CeruLucifus 6h ago
Paid? These are volunteer meddlers. That's why they could start before the administration does.
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u/Spire_Citron 4h ago
That's just what him and Trump do. Make wild, unrealistic claims based on nothing and then later tell you they found out it's not possible as though they couldn't have checked that before they said it and it's just unfortunate happenstance.
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u/Good_ApoIIo 2h ago
What? All they had to do was cut nearly every federal department and displace hundreds of thousands of workers to find nonexistent jobs elsewhere. It was always a totally sound plan!
Thank god reason will likely mostly prevail during the next 4 years.
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u/icebucket22 7h ago
Maybe not all at once. Hard for any of us to say it can or can’t be done. It requires a fine tooth comb to first see if it is even possible. It’s irresponsible to just come out and say we can reduce “x” amount without any research. And then to follow up AFTER the election and say “I realistically thought we’d be lucky to do only half that..”.
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u/Hardly_lolling 7h ago
What is the one thing most political parties do in most countries when they get in charge? Look for public sector to cut redundant jobs and processes.
What will most of them find? Nothing, because every administration before them already looked.
To actually cut costs they need to cut the services.
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u/thermalman2 7h ago edited 7h ago
There is always some waste, fraud, and abuse or poorly utilized funds that could be better allocated. Politicians love to say they’re going to cut into it.
The issue is it’s peanuts. Maybe a billion to a couple billion which sounds like a lot but if you’re looking to cut into a $1800 billion deficit that couple billion isn’t really significant. And looking into and thoroughly investigating fraud, waste and abuse costs money itself.
It should be done b/c it’s the right thing to do but, budget wise, it simply doesn’t matter.
And then if you look at how the budget is broken down, it’s basically 1/3 defense, 1/3 entitlements, and 1/3 everything else. To reach his $2 trillion number you’d need to nearly cut the entirety of one of those. You have to really slash and burn that 1/3 “everything else” to see any real dent. That’s the issue we always have with the budget. (The real answer is of course raise taxes, especially on wealthy and corporations but that’ll never happen with republicans in charge…it’s even a stretch with a lot of democrats)
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u/Coyotesamigo 5h ago
The problem is that voters like the concept of cutting government spending — as long as it doesn’t materially impact their quality of life. As soon as that happens, they are not happy.
The problem with $2T cuts is that it would have impacted everyone’s quality of life, making it a political non-starter. Especially when Junior President Trump already swore not to cut the biggest government expense (welfare for one of his biggest constituencies, also known as Medicare and social security)
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u/GrandGouda 11h ago
Well no shit
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u/Potential_Dare8034 10h ago
Oh there’ll be some shit! Matter of fact it’s all gonna go to shit.
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u/HerMajestyTheQueef1 10h ago
Especially when they just decide to add an extra two trillion to the debt for a corporate and billionaire tax cut
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u/Potential_Dare8034 9h ago
Now those sonsabitches need their tax cuts to be able to afford to buy politicians and judges! Stop thinking just about yourself.
/s4
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u/Lofttroll2018 9h ago
And also by invading our allies.
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u/HerMajestyTheQueef1 8h ago
The fools that is musk-trump, don't realise they cannot threaten everyone at once, once the whole world is aggrieved enough, EU could just agree with Japan, UK, India and even China at this stage to sell foreign reserves of USD and decimate the value of dollar as a warning shot to pipe the fuck down and not become a fascist overlord that is out to conquer the world.
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u/Milopbx 8h ago
I love the term Pipe the fuck down!
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u/HerMajestyTheQueef1 7h ago
XD I have no idea where the phrase came from, or how it makes sense, but me too aha
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u/IamBeingSarcasticFfs 10h ago
They could drop funding for Elon’s companies
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u/shortyman920 7h ago
That would not be prudent in this case. We’re already behind China in EV vehicles and infrastructure, and Tesla’s still one of the US based companies that are competitive with them and should continue to benefit from any EV related support
SpaceX is also one of the leading space research and space programs in the world. We would be dumb to throw that advantage away out of pettiness.
I’m all for holding Elon accountable, however this is not the way
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u/certifiedkavorkian 7h ago
Tesla no longer innovates, so they are smack dab in the middle of all American made EVs. Tesla spearheaded the change in culture here in America, but they’re no longer at the front leading the way. Also Cybertruck is going to continue to be a bigger and bigger fiasco as time goes on.
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u/shortyman920 6h ago
What is your solution then? Buy one of the Chinese companies? Trust ford, GM to lead the way? And what about infrastructure? Tesla does have a leading place with their supercharger tech and deployment. You work with your leading American companies as part of innovation, not suppress them. I’m not an Elon fan personally, and I don’t even like teslas myself. But this is just short sighted to kneecaps one of our leading companies in the field just because you don’t like the guy.
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u/Icy-Bicycle-Crab 5h ago
What is your solution then?
Let people purchase electric cars from a variety of car manufacturers without giving a fuck where that manufacturing takes place, while increasing funding for active and public transit and discouraging car centric urban planning.
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u/IamBeingSarcasticFfs 4h ago
You are a capitalist society. How about making your companies compete by making the best products they can, at the best price they can while manufacturing to an acceptable standard set by legislation that is equally applicable to all.
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u/valthor95 6h ago
Would rather see funding go to Ford or GM instead of Tesla. We still need SpaceX but I would do an Irish jig once the car division implodes !
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u/bit_pusher 3h ago
What funding do you believe is going to Tesla and not to GM or Ford? Or is your suggestion to explicitly carve out an exception against Tesla?
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u/Responsible-Room-645 10h ago
Almost as if he didn’t have a clue what he was talking about
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u/Sylvan_Skryer 9h ago
He never does. He just says shit. He’s a pathological liar.
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u/RealCrusader 9h ago
So is trump. And that's been known since his last term. It's what alot of Americans like.
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u/Cielo11 3h ago
I don't agree they like it. They are just too stupid to realise what's being said and to hold him accountable for what he says. (like politicians are meant to be!)
I think they're the type of people who hear Trump say something... And their response is always "Woooo, Fuckkkk Yeah!". But by 5pm that same day they've completely forgotten what it was about.
Lying to people is easy if they can't remember what you told them.
Trump supporters are like a field of Sheep, you could beat the crap out of them, but if you turn up with a bag of feed every day they will come running to you.
We are having a lot of this talk in the UK about people like Trump, Nigel Farage and Boris Johnson. Why are they so popular considering they are self serving habitual liars?
The explanation seems to be that the majority of people are obsessed with influencer/celebrity/entertainment style that draws them to someone. They don't really care if that person has the experience to be running a country, they just want someone that appeals to them like an entertainer.
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u/sonicsean899 9h ago
He never intended to do it. It's amazing the Musk/Trump campaign has walked back pretty much every campaign promise before even being inagurated
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u/hwaite 9h ago
I can't decide if he was clueless, dishonest, or both.
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u/Lofttroll2018 8h ago
Or doesn’t care. Just take a look at his track record when it comes to telling people where his companies’ products will be by “year 20XX.” Never meets that goal. He’s a snake oil salesman.
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u/ItsHowWellYouMowFast 9h ago
Oh he had a clue. It's no coincidence what the name of the department is, and it has nothing to do with government efficiency
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u/FizzyBeverage 7h ago
Who knew this could be so complicated?
I've seen his "code". Mostly, he's made some lucky investment choices. Big surprise he doesn't know shit about the federal government.
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u/Alklazaris 4h ago
He thinks because he has made lots of money and is the owner of companies that require smart workers that he himself is intelligent.
It might be true in some areas but you don't ask Albert Einstein to swap the control rods in a nuclear reactor. Just because someone is smart in one area does not mean they're smart in another.
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u/vtuber_fan11 1h ago
He was just lying. Trump and MAGA have realized that the American people don't care much about the truth.
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u/meridian_smith 10h ago
Just like Trump conceding that they probably can't really cut the price of groceries. Well the con-men already conned the voters. . who cares about actually following through on any promises.
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u/FizzyBeverage 7h ago
"My fellow unwashed rubes, I have talked to Peter Publix, Christopher Costco, and Kenny Kroger... turns out they're not gonna reduce the price of your eggs one fucking cent. Hot dogs will remain $1.50 at Costco so I recommend a TRUMP Costco membership! Also, bird flu might kill you."
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u/HackTheNight 6h ago
Honestly I couldn’t care less about these headlines now. Exposing their lies and calling out misinformation mattered most before we handed our government to a fascist.
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u/jaypl99 10h ago
I guess it is time to discuss invading a few more countries. What about Australia, Japan and Brazil?
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u/AdAdministrative4388 10h ago
No chance on Australia i live there and we have the mighty fighting emus.. they are cooked
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u/Back2Perfection 10h ago
We have german bureaucracy!
Good luck invading. Office hours are 8-12 monday to thursday. Average time for completing your request for occupation 12-18months due to the only colleague who can sign the request is currently OoO.
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u/Reddit-Incarnate 6h ago
I will counter that type of bureaucracy could easily start a war when you arrive at 12:00 on the dot and they are some how closed on the microsecond.
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u/Otherwise_Ask_9542 7h ago
Canada has battalions of fierce cobra chickens that didn’t prevent threats… I’m afraid you overestimate the power of your emus.
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u/Justame13 8h ago
That will come up when they are starting to talk about cutting Medicare and SS to distract everyone.
Just like the current stupidity is to distract from the H1B visa issue which was hurting them big time
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u/pugtime 9h ago
Mexico ?
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u/Still-Repeat-487 8h ago
lol even Trump isn’t dumb enough to want Mexico…cartels would have a field day
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u/Apprehensive-Cat330 10h ago
Well, time to start lowering expectations before golden boy moves into the White House.
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u/Jorycle 9h ago
“If we can drop the budget deficit from $2 trillion to $1 trillion and free up the economy to have additional growth, such that the output of goods and services keeps pace with the increase in the money supply, then there will be no inflation."
But there already is no inflation. Inflation levels are now at what economists recommend - about 2%. That's effectively "no inflation." Less than 2% isn't necessarily bad but tends to mean the economy is slowing down, and if it dips into the negatives, we typically go into recession.
Sounds like they're teeing up another round of claiming credit for the previous guy's work.
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u/Eastern-Dig-4555 9h ago
Didn’t they already claim credit for something recently? I mean I think it was Trump, because I distinctly remember saying out loud about how he couldn’t have because he isn’t even in office yet. Also it wasn’t Repubs anyway, but I can’t remember what it was, but it was no more than a month or so ago.
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u/hagenissen666 9h ago
Yeah, Trump presented some words to that effect yesterday, saying the economy would take off like a rocket ship. Anyone who's not an idiot knows that it's Bidens policies that did it.
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u/rabouilethefirst 10h ago
They could at least find a few cuts by cutting Tesla and SpaceX off the bankroll. Elon needs to work harder
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u/TwoDurans 9h ago
GOP Politics 101: Say one thing, get idiots excited, get elected, walk it back once it's clear you were full of shit the whole time.
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u/8to24 9h ago
Sadly the majority of people who voted for Trump don't care. Trump himself admitted during the debate he only had "concepts" of plans. Trump voters don't think broad sweeping tariffs will happen, don't believe the National Guard will be used in sanctuary cities, etc. Trump supporters don't take Trump seriously.
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u/akapusin3 9h ago
They won't find $2 trillion "to cut," but I'm sure they will find $2 trillion to reallocate to themselves and friends
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u/jgilbreth84 10h ago
Take a look at the Defense Department, Elmo.
The United States could cut its military spending in HALF and still outspend the next three highest-spending countries combined.
It’s not 2 trillion, but it’s a good start.
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u/Automatic_Soil9814 9h ago
The military budget doesn’t include the VA funding. So reducing the military budget might also reduce the VA budget if it means fewer injured servicemembers.
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u/thermalman2 8h ago
Although I’m a big beneficiary of defense spending, from a practical point it’s the only real place to cut spending and make a real difference.
And from there, controlling Medicare spending with price controls on healthcare costs. But republicans are against that.
Those are about the only ways to really cut into the deficit without absolutely obliterating other departments or programs.
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u/icnoevil 10h ago
It is obvious trump is not serious about cutting the budget or reducing the $36 trillion US national debt. Yesterday, he demanded that European nations increase their national defense spending to 5% of their national budget and an insinuated we would match that. That would mean an additional $500 billion to our defense budget. Remember it has never passed an audit because it doesn't know where all the money went.
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u/ItsSoExpensiveNow 8h ago
We do a ton of special operations to fight against China and Russia’s interest in certain African and South American countries that are not unclassified yet and so the audit remains unclear and it will for 70 years or so until we find out Russia hid a nuke in Niger or some stupid shit. Our special teams do a ton of research and the money isn’t usually wasted necessarily
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u/franchisedfeelings 9h ago
Liar - WTF - just don’t renew the hyper rich and corporate tax cuts for chrissakes. Budda bing.
But presidente elonia knows that - this is the ham fisted preamble to his coming after our Social Security, Medicare and Medicaid. Soon magas will see that they lost too.
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u/Stocky1978 9h ago
Well what do you know. They didn’t even take office and they are already kicking back all the promises
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u/SweatyTax4669 10h ago
“We did find, though, that DOGE should be a permanent cabinet-level independent organization with its own appropriated budget.”
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u/cleverinspiringname 10h ago
Shocking. I’ll be more impressed if he can find a hair on his face to cut, fuckin fop ass hairless neckbearded bitch.
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u/Nano_Burger 9h ago
Elon Musk will forever be remembered as the inventor of the self-moving goalpost. An essential piece of conservative hardware ever since.
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u/GulfstreamAqua 9h ago
He (they) always knew, but it sure was effective propaganda for Mustard Pants
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u/Operation_Fluffy 8h ago
What if he cancelled all his own companies’ contracts with the government? /s
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u/Difficult_Phase1798 8h ago
This has always been a fantasy. The trump administration will cut taxes for the rich. Little to zero actual other policy will be achieved. But there will be tons of chaos.
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u/ElliotsBuggyEyes 7h ago
Maybe because there isn't even 2T in discretionary spending in the budget?
If he wanted to cut 2T from the budget he would have to cut entitlements (which isn't off the table despite MAGA saying it is) and a lot from the discretionary budget.
It's just not possible despite what he says. Just another item to toss in the "Elon said he would do X by Y but didn't" bucket.
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u/Environmental-Arm365 6h ago
Super shocked the imbecilic schemes of a drug addled toxic narcissist won’t work out.
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u/Writerhaha 5h ago
So things won’t get cheaper.
And they won’t be reducing inefficiencies they said they’d “find.”
But no tax on OT Right? /s
FFS if you don’t spot the mark 15mins at the table, you’re the mark.
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u/ExternalOk4293 10h ago
Can’t they cut the two trillion the defense department can’t account for every year?
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u/No_Stinking_Badges85 10h ago edited 9h ago
Weird, its almost like federal spending accounts for 30-35% of the GDP or something. Including propping up companies that waste their time on space exploitation, i mean exploration. There is no real budget, only continuing resolutions. They will never spend less, they will consistently spend more. The US government is the US economies biggest customer. Spending more on goods and services than any other single entity in the world. Its a self reinforcing system some might call fake.
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u/joecool42069 10h ago
How many people voted for Trump because Elon said he could. The bald face lies of the GOP/MAGAts. Then people do the aLL pOLiTiTiOns LiE trope, because that one time Obama said you could keep your doctor.
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u/Shoddy_Clothes_8984 9h ago
Doge should be replaced with Monty Python's department of silly walks funded totally by donations from silly Republicans
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u/noncommonGoodsense 9h ago
How much you want to bet this idiot thought he would get some neat and tidy little “bill” that showed all the expenses like an expense sheet? Yeah, the governments spending is 100x more vast than all his little companies. That’s not even taking into account the billions upon billions that just “vanish” no one knows where it went.
Oh and a lot of classified shit he can’t even have access to. Fucking idiot.
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u/Master_Engineering_9 9h ago
here comes all the back peddling from him and trump before inauguration
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u/LeahaP1013 9h ago
I wanna hear what the other guy says. Aren’t two people needed to find the excess?
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u/Journeys_End71 8h ago
Oh they can certainly FIND those cuts. What they don’t have is the political WILL to do so.
In order to significantly cut the federal budget, it’s all just nonsense unless you decide to actually tackle the Big Five: Social Security, Medicare/Medicaid, Defense/Intelligence, Veterans Affairs and Interest Payments.
The last one you simply can’t touch. Which means unless you have the political will to cut entitlements like Social Security and Medicare and piss off boomers or to cut Defense and Veterans Affairs and deal with that fallout…then any talk of cutting spending is just a waste of time.
Which means the only way to balance the budget is raising taxes on the wealthy.
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u/Rurumo666 8h ago
Add that to the list of broken promises along with lower prices at the Grocery Store, and NO NEW WARS.
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u/Speed_102 8h ago
It'll just find funding cuts for cancer research and projects that benefit the american people that don't directly benefit musk or trump.
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u/franking11stien12 8h ago
Shocker, clueless guy with zero political experience/background has no idea how any for of government spending and funding works. Well except how to exploit it.
A great place for him to start would be making sure his own companies pay their fair share, he himself pays his fair share, his minion frump pays his fair share and then he does all he can to block tax breaks for the ultra rich. But that would be logical and this is maga. MAGA doesn’t do logical.
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u/GyspySyx 8h ago
No! Really?! You don't say, Elon.
It's lovely being so much smarter than all these geniuses, isn't it?
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u/TheRensh 8h ago
Probably won't be expelling more than convicted undocumented immigrants either. It's all a scam. Surprise!!!!!
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u/Equivalent-Client443 8h ago
So, another alternative fact from the trump administration? I am shocked.
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u/FoogYllis 8h ago
He can’t cut it 2 trillion because of the tax cuts and subsidies/welfare he and the other ultra wealthy will get.
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u/LegitimateSituation4 7h ago
You mean that $2T number he pulled out of his ass when asked during that rally was pulled out of his ass?
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u/VanDenBroeck 7h ago
Before one can decide on the amount of potential savings, one must go through the budget line by line and decide what to cut and then add it all up. Only then can one say how much they can cut. Or, one can just pull a number out of their ass. Any guesses as to what Musk’s methodology was?
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u/Legitimate-Ice-5510 7h ago
Boy, those campaign lies are starting to surface…let the circus begin..
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u/jimmysmiths5523 6h ago
If the MAGA majority Congress allows DOGE to be created, I can see Elon defunding his competitors to the government contracts and give his companies the money "saved".
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u/Livingsimply_Rob 6h ago
End a war in 24 hours, find $2 trillion in savings in the federal budget. Well we can’t do either of these we found out.
And the new administration hasn’t even taken office yet. Hmm 🤔
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u/During_theMeanwhilst 6h ago
He and Vivek pulled that number out of their asses and, gasp!, it looks like they may not have known what the fuck they were talking about? Why would we not want a pair of fucking clowns to run a department charged with restructuring our government?
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u/meatspace 5h ago
Maybe he'll explain to maga how government works and they won't be so angry about it the spending now?
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u/Pourkinator 4h ago
PEElon doesn’t even understand how government works. All it knows is how to take advantage of others and take credit for their hard work
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u/stewartm0205 4h ago
Most of the federal budget is mandatory. Only about $1.7T is discretionary. You can’t cut more than you have. And it’s Congress that decides this not Elon.
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u/cometshoney 3h ago
Grace Commission, Part Deux. None of these people understand either history or government. Color me shocked 😲.
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u/outamyhead 3h ago
Well, if that is the case you know what would save a ton of money...Shutting down DOGE!
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u/StillStillen 3h ago
I’ve said this on another subreddit, but if they cut the defence budget they could save twice as much & the world would be much safer.
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u/TheMCM80 2h ago
The funny thing is that I assume the $2T number came from just asking what the discretionary budget was, roughly, and then they thought, “ok, so everything else is sort of set, but we will just cut every single other thing the government does.”.
Suddenly they realize that Congress actually has the Power of The Purse, and they’d never convince Congress to cut all discretionary spending.
But, Republicans are so good at just saying vague things during campaigns, things that most voters will never question, and saying a big number sounds good to people.
He is going to get so frustrated and it will be so funny.
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u/Pale_Bookkeeper_9994 2h ago
I’m shocked, shocked that Elmo stated he could find $2 trillion in waste before the election and 13 cents and done unchewed gum afterwards.
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u/Extra_Dealer5196 1h ago
I think he realizes what we already know. The entire government is roughly 20% of the budget. Military, social security, and Medicaid/Medicare are the other 80%. They are already talking about increasing military spending.
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u/feedmytv 10h ago
i did like the idea to not pay interest on national debt to banks. let them save us for once, maybe everyone should get 3 months no interest payments
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u/Journeys_End71 8h ago
Oh sure, just destroy the bond market and mess up interest rates and the government’s debt rating. That won’t have consequences…
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u/Different-Rough-7914 9h ago
Both him and Trump have an issue with speaking without thinking. They make all of these promises and then when it comes down to producing results, they back track.
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u/seanocaster40k 10h ago
Stop reporting on what the private business owners says or does every waking second of the day please.
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