The thing that gets us is the casual, almost dismissive way Elon now acknowledges DOGE’s failure… like a 5-year-old who simply got tired of the new toy he begged Santa Claus for (or, more accurately, paid almost $300 million for).
Upon his departure, Elon explained that “the federal bureaucracy situation” was “much worse” than he realized, and that it’s “mostly just a lot of hard work.” Wow, Elon! What a shocking revelation this is. In July 2026, he told The Economist that he simply got “carried away.” Carried away? That is the underestimate of the century.
Elon’s cavalier attitude about the havoc he wreaked is even more remarkable given what he gained from it. The conflicts of interest involved here were epic, and the fact that this was ever tolerated is a flaming red flag that should cause us all to be seriously concerned about the level of corruption in this administration (read more here).
Elon’s company SpaceX is regulated by the U.S. Federal Aviation Administration (FAA). In September 2024, SpaceX was fined over $600,000 by the agency for not following license requirements for two rocket launches, which infuriated Elon. But then on February 5th, Elon and the U.S. Department of Transportation announced that Elon had access to all FAA technologies to make “rapid safety upgrades.” Ummm…what?
Then, the FAA abruptly put a $2.4 billion Verizon contract to upgrade its air traffic control communications systems under review – reportedly so that the FAA could cancel it to … wait for it… give the business to Starlink, another Elon company. SpaceX employees were promptly issued conflict-of-interest waivers to be able to review FAA technology “on behalf of the United States.” Several of these SpaceX employees even had a FAA email address. Ummm…what?
Of the FAA’s potential shift from Verizon to Starlink, Elon said on X, “The Verizon system is not working and so is putting air travelers at serious risk.” Right. Of course it is, buddy. < In July 2025, the FAA told lawmakers they were no longer considering replacing the Verizon existing contracts with Starlink. >
So much of Elon’s time in Washington seemed to be driven by personal grievances. Because Tesla, SpaceX, and four other businesses Elon controls had been investigated and/or fined 32 different times by eleven different federal agencies, he had beef with lots of people throughout the United States government, including the Office of Government Ethics and the Securities and Exchange Commission, whose leadership he publicly called “bastards.”
He had an ax to grind with the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, an agency that investigated complaints about Tesla’s debt collection and loan policies – enacting his revenge in February 2025 when he fired the head of the agency, locked the doors, and pretty much shut down all work, telling the employees to stay home. Big Balls and the other kids quickly gained access to the agency’s computer systems, including personnel rolls and financial records.
Elon was also seriously ticked off at the Office of Federal Contract Compliance Programs, a U.S. Labor Department agency created by President Lyndon Johnson in 1965 to prohibit discrimination by government contractors. The source of Elon’s ire was an audit the agency had opened on Tesla’s Fremont, California plant in October 2024 to investigate potential workplace discrimination and to verify adherence to federal equal employment and civil rights laws required of government contractors.
But never fear! Donald Trump had his biggest donor’s back, directing the agency to stop much of its work, essentially closing the case. The attorney the Trump/Vance administration appointed to oversee the agency – and ultimately dismantle it – had once represented SpaceX in matters involving the Labor Department.
Then there were the government contracts. A February 2025 analysis by The Washington Post found that Elon and his companies had received at least $38 billion in government contracts, loans, subsidies and tax credits over the past twenty years. Almost two-thirds of that money was secured in just the previous five years (at least $6.3 billion was committed in 2024 alone). Fifty-two contracts with seven government agencies were ongoing, which were set to pay Musk & Co. $11.8 billion more over time.
Six months after Donald Trump returned to the Oval Office, Elon’s A.I. company xAI signed a contract worth up to $200 million with the Department of Defense. The company was also added to the General Services Administration (GSA) schedule, meaning that its products are approved for purchase across every single federal office and agency.
And that’s just the deals that were public. SpaceX is reportedly building spy satellites for the Pentagon’s National Reconnaissance Office, a contract estimated to be worth $1.8 billion.
In June 2026, CNN reported that, all in, almost all of Elon Musk’s now trillion-dollar wealth came from United States taxpayers and policymakers in the form of government grants, loans, contracts and regulatory policies. SpaceX and Tesla, for example, both struggled mightily as startups before receiving taxpayer subsidies.
< Remember, far more important than the actual dollar amounts received is when those dollars were received. Elon acknowledged this when he said in 2012, “The fact (is) that we could not have started SpaceX, nor could we have reached this point, without the help of NASA.” … and when he admitted in 2020 that Tesla was close to declaring bankruptcy in 2019 before being saved by selling other car companies “emissions credits” provided for by a government program to reduce carbon emissions (between 2008 and 2019, sales of regulatory credits generated more than $2 billion for Tesla). >
Think about what this means. All of Elon’s successes – all his creating, pioneering, achieving, and money minting – were made possible, not only by migrating from South Africa to a country that is stable and where the rule of law is sound, but through that country’s federal subsidies, loans and contracts. And while he was gobbling up all the favors, money and power he could, he was doing everything possible to burn down the pathways for everyone else. What a class act.
Even though this horror show is now in the history books, breaking down the disaster that was DOGE is still an extremely important thing for us to do so that everyone can clearly see that there is a right way to do this and a wrong way to do this.
Without question, the United States government – a goliath that spent $7 trillion in FY2025 and employs around 3 million people – needs a major overhaul… which is why 1787 named our effort to do just that Operation Overhaul! (see what we did there?) However, the way we go about doing it matters. A LOT.
1787 can do this way better, with far less sleaze. Operation Overhaul, working in close collaboration with Congress, can reduce our debt, close the gap on our deficit, and end the massive waste, inefficiency and corruption that infects every level of our federal government.