Elon Musk, the unelected billionaire who has wielded a visibly large influence on the government of the United States since the inauguration of President Donald Trump last month, could not have cut a more ironic figure. Not satisfied with shuttering government departments and calling for thousands of government employees to be sacked, Musk stood in the Oval Office this week, attired in a blazer and baseball cap, next to the seated President Trump, and lashed out at the “unelected bureaucracy.” If the people cannot have their will represented by the president, the house, and the senate, then we do not live in a democracy but an unelected bureaucracy, he stated. Either Musk was utterly oblivious to the import of every word on himself, or he was being super-smart to the point of being facetious.
Musk, the world’s richest billionaire whose political dabbling has taken him to the far-right parties in Germany, was tasked with cutting down the size and spending of the US government in an order signed by the president himself, giving him the authority through the newly-created Department of Government Efficiency (DoGE); the order instructed the heads of government agencies to comply with DoGE. The unsettling influence of Musk on the Trump presidency, which neither Trump nor he hides, has drawn a range of responses. The most obvious one has been of shock and disbelief among Democrats, a growing section of Americans, and the international media, some of whom termed it a “hostile takeover” of the US government. The American media would have criticised this as a “coup” had it happened in a non-Western nation.
Even among the most ardent followers of both men, there is a growing sense of disquiet about where this will stop, given Musk’s control over payment systems, personnel management, and information. They did not seem to mind Musk’s overarching presence and blatant spending of mind-boggling millions of dollars during the election campaign. The shrewd billionaire is extracting his pound of flesh and more. Musk, it must be remembered, is a foreign-born citizen and has not been confirmed by Congress. But there is a method in the madness; Musk is on track to dismantle the structures of the government and consolidate power as he did with the companies he bought into, including Tesla and X (formerly Twitter). But the federal government is not a software company. The venerable monthly The Atlantic termed it as the “rapid unscheduled disassembly” of the government. The world is watching this unfold – with justified trepidation.
