Elon Musk was not at a Wednesday House hearing about “rightsizing” government, but his presence was most definitely felt.
The Oversight and Government Reform Committee’s hearing Wednesday was tasked with looking into shrinking the bureaucracy and making it more efficient. But much of its discussion was about Musk and his targeting of places like the Treasury Department and the U.S. Agency for International Development.
The tech mogul, whom President Donald Trump has tasked with leading the so-called Department of Government Efficiency, has in a few short weeks taken a blowtorch to the federal government. His team of engineers has visited agencies big and small, delving into employee data and government payments.
Rep. Melanie Stansbury (D-N.M.) — ranking member of the subcommittee focused on DOGE — confronted her Republican counterparts on why they were shielding Musk.
She called the Tesla owner “an unelected, unvetted, unqualified private citizen and billionaire who is literally dismantling our agencies.”
Earlier, the committee, on a 20-19 vote, rejected a motion to subpoena Musk to appear before Congress.
“So what the hell is going on? How can you sit here and defend this?” Stansbury said.
Oversight Chair James Comer (R-Ky.) scoffed that Democrats had “Musk Derangement Syndrome.”
Though he wasn’t present, Musk was paying close attention to the hearing. On the social media platform X that he owns, Musk commented on clips of the hearing while insulting lawmakers.
At one point he told Rep. Ro Khanna (D-Calif.), who represents Silicon Valley and has urged Musk to engage with lawmakers, “Don’t be a dick.”
Khanna noted the pejorative during his live questioning of witness Thomas Schatz, president of Citizens Against Government Waste, and then carried on.
“Do you agree that he has no authority to stop payments on anything that Congress has authorized and appropriated?” asked Khanna, referring to Musk.
Schatz responded, “I think that’s being tested, but I think generally that should be correct.”
Musk has gone after USAID, which the administration says is now a part of the State Department. Its entire staff is on leave and funding has been cut off.
The DOGE team has been granted access to sensitive systems at Treasury, the Office of Personnel Management and the General Services Administration. Musk’s fingerprints are also on Trump’s mass resignation scheme for the federal workforce.
All of this has upended Washington in a big way, considering Trump, not Musk, was elected president. But GOP members defended the richest man in the world, whose business interests are regulated by a number of agencies, saying the president advocated creating DOGE with Musk at its center on the campaign trail last year.
“This was no surprise to the American people. The American people love DOGE so much,” said Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-Ga.), chair of the DOGE subcommittee. “They love the concept of saving the federal government, saving Americans, and putting America first, cutting the waste in the spending, cutting down the size of the federal government.”
Praise for Iowa governor
Republican lawmakers sought to use the hearing to highlight one of their party’s political stars, Iowa Gov. Kim Reynolds. Reynolds described her efforts to consolidate state government and up its performance, saying, “Iowa was doing DOGE before DOGE was a thing.”
Greene asked the governor about Iowa cutting the number of its Cabinet departments from 37 down to 16. “Did this make the Iowa government more efficient, or less efficient?” she said.
“More efficient,” Reynolds said. “We’re actually doing a better job of it and putting more money into the programs or returning it back to the taxpayers.”
The hearing also was a chance to spotlight what may be on the chopping block next. Rep. Paul Gosar (R-Ariz.) asked about selling off federal lands to state and local communities.
And Rep. Maxwell Frost (D-Fla.) pressed Reynolds on whether she agreed with Trump on eliminating the Federal Emergency Management Administration.
“I think we should take a look at it and see how those services are delivered,” the Iowa governor said.
Democratspraised Reynolds, seeking to draw a contrast on how she reorganized her own state government, working with her legislators, compared with Musk’s wrecking ball effort at the federal level.
“You didn’t lay off people. You tried, in fact, to move people around?” said Rep. Gerry Connolly (D-Va.), the Oversight Committee ranking member.
“We made that commitment at the beginning of the process,” Reynolds said. “First of all, these were common sense changes. It was a realignment.”
Comer said, “We welcome Elon Musk. We welcome any individual in America who has ideas on making government more efficient.”
