Elon Musk’s DOGE Defense Cuts Won’t Affect This Key Person

Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth announced plans to cut $580 million in “wasteful spending” at the Pentagon, but the major slashes to grants and contracts will spare Elon Musk’s SpaceX, The Intercept reported Thursday.

Over the past 25 years, the Pentagon’s contracts with SpaceX have only grown, totaling almost $8 billion. Musk and his businesses have received a whopping $38 billion in total government contracts. On March 21, the day after Hegseth announced the sweeping cuts, he had a private meeting with Musk. In a post on X, Hegseth said the two had discussed “innovation, efficiencies & smarter production.”

Despite Hegseth’s cuts, Musk, who heads the government’s cost-cutting efforts, is poised to make a killing from upcoming defense contracts to work on new rocket launchpads and rocket-booster landing zones, as well as Donald Trump’s fantasies of creating a “Golden Dome” missile defense system that is projected to cost up to $2.5 trillion—more than double the Pentagon’s currently enormous budget.

Stephen Semler, a senior fellow at the Center for International Policy, told The Intercept that since the election, SpaceX has become the Pentagon’s “most valued” contractor. Musk’s financial support of the Trump administration had boosted investor confidence that there would be kickbacks, he explained.

“Musk and DOGE are ignoring the one place where you would actually find savings within the government,” Semler said. “Musk realizes that although he is already getting tons of money from NASA contracts, the untapped potential for his businesses from the Pentagon budget is truly massive.”

Rather than make cuts to SpaceX contracts, Hegseth opted to eliminate programs such as the Defense Civilian Human Resources Management System, which Hegseth claimed had ballooned to 780 percent over budget. Hegseth said that in addition to cuts announced in February, the Defense Department was now prepared to cut a total of around $800 million from its budget—a comparatively small slice of the Pentagon’s nearly $1 trillion budget.

William Hartung, a senior research fellow at the Quincy Institute for Responsible Statecraft, told The Intercept that proposed cuts were still “extremely modest” when compared to other agencies. “And unlike these other agencies, savings found in one part of the Pentagon will simply be invested in other Pentagon programs, with no net reduction in the department’s bottom line,” he added.

Republicans and Democrats in the Senate are proposing a bipartisan bill to try and rein in President Trump’s crazy tariffs.

Iowa Republican Chuck Grassley and Washington Democrat Maria Cantwell, both members of the Senate Finance Committee, are co-sponsoring the “Trade Review Act of 2025,” which would require congressional approval for the president to impose new tariffs, one day after Trump’s “Liberation Day” event upended international markets.

Specifically, Trump would have to notify Congress about new tariffs within 48 hours of imposing them, and then the House and Senate would have 60 days to approve them or else the tariffs would expire. According to the two senators, the bill is modeled after the War Powers Resolution of 1973, which places limits on the president’s ability to deploy troops overseas without congressional approval.

In a statement, Grassley said, “For too long, Congress has delegated its clear authority to regulate interstate and foreign commerce to the executive branch.”

“I’m joining Senator Cantwell to introduce the bipartisan Trade Review Act of 2025 to reassert Congress’ constitutional role and ensure Congress has a voice in trade policy,” the statement added.

Cantwell said that the bill was necessary to reassert “Congress’s role over trade policy to ensure rules-based trade policies are transparent, consistent, and benefit the American public.

“Arbitrarily, tariffs, particularly on our allies, damage U.S. export opportunities and raise prices for American consumers and businesses. As representatives of the American people, Congress has a duty to stop actions that will cause them harm,” Cantwell’s statement said.

But the bill faces little chance of passing, especially considering that its House companion has no Republican co-sponsors and would likely be blocked by House Speaker Mike Johnson. Johnson praised the tariffs on X Wednesday night, claiming that they “level the playing field for American workers and innovators.” Even if, by some miracle, the bill passes the House, Trump would likely veto it. The War Powers Act of 1973, moreover, has been proven time and time again to be toothless—presidents have deployed troops on a number of occasions without congressional approval.

It looks like the country will be in economic free fall for a while.

American companies are not “leaping” to hire new employees, as the White House promised. Instead, they’re rapidly letting them go.

Stellantis—one of the Big Three automakers in the U.S.—announced Thursday that it would be laying off hundreds of U.S. workers in the wake of Donald Trump’s sweeping tariffs. The company is also planning to temporarily pause production at two foreign assembly plants in Canada and Mexico.

“We are continuing to assess the medium- and long-term effects of these tariffs on our operations, but also have decided to take some immediate actions, including temporarily pausing production at some of our Canadian and Mexican assembly plants,” Chief Operating Officer Antonio Filosa told employees in an email on Thursday.

Some 900 U.S.-based employees are expected to be laid off at Stellantis’s Warren Stamping and Sterling Stamping plants in Michigan, as well as three of its transmission and casting plants in Indiana.

Speaking with CBS earlier Thursday, Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick had claimed that “people are going to start building factories right now” and that companies will “employ Americans today.”

“Factories rebuilding, all the ships are going to be running hot across America now; you’re going to see employment leaping starting today,” Lutnick said.

But Lutnick’s insistence on following Trump’s tariff plan has veered totally into the delusional. In an interview with CNN the same day, Lutnick implored voters and investors to “let Donald Trump run the global economy,” promising that Trump would cut deals “if and only if these countries can change everything about themselves.”

Wall Street analysts have predicted bad news for automakers and their investors as they attempt to navigate Trump’s 25 percent tariff on imported vehicles and auto parts, which took effect Thursday. In the near term, that will look like increased market volatility and shaken supply chains.

While there are vehicles that are assembled in America, there are no vehicles in the U.S. that are made entirely with domestic products and labor. Instead, producing a car or a truck requires thousands of parts that are sourced from the global supply chain—an international relationship that Trump’s tariffs will undoubtedly hurt.

“We stress that the concept of a U.S. car maker with parts all from the U.S. is a fictional tale that does not exist and would take years to make this concept a reality,” Wedbush analyst Dan Ives wrote in an investor note Wednesday obtained by CNBC.

Multiple National Security Council staffers have been fired at the behest of MAGA conspiracy theorist and Trump loyalist Laura Loomer, according to Axios and the Associated Press.

The NSC, headed by Mike Waltz, made headlines after Signalgate, in which Waltz inadvertently added The Atlantic’s Jeffrey Goldberg to a Signal chat where multiple Cabinet members were discussing plans to bomb Yemen.

A source close to the situation told Axios that the firings were “being labeled as an anti-neocon move.” Waltz has been accused of being insufficiently MAGA by the farthest right of the party.

Loomer apparently “presented [Trump] with her research and evidence” alleging that more traditional neoconservative foreign policy hawks were too well represented in the administration.

Loomer, who Trump has described as a “free spirit,” is a “proud Islamophobe” who was pushed out of Trump’s inner circle during the campaign due to numerous statements that were deemed too incendiary for MAGA. She’s stated that 9/11 was an “inside job” and that the White House would “smell like curry” if Kamala Harris, who is of Indian descent, won the election.

This may be the worst time to allow a crank like Loomer back into the fold. The Signalgate controversy has already demonstrated the administration’s capacity for foolishness, and relationships with the rest of the world are arguably at an all-time low, thanks to Trump’s suicidal tariff regimen.

Loomer has declined to share any of what she discussed in her Oval Office meeting.

Steven Mnuchin, the treasury secretary during Donald Trump’s first term, is worried about the president’s new tariffs and hoping to change them via the president’s favorite medium: television.

On CNBC Thursday morning, Mnuchin tried to delicately ask for carve-outs and concessions, attempting to explain that “there’s a transition period here that needs to be adjusted to.

“It’s the larger tariffs that are called the reciprocal tariffs. I’m hopeful that those will be negotiated down, that those will bring people to the table, that those will be negotiated down. For many businesses, it takes a while to move the manufacturing base,” Mnuchin said.

“I hope the president will consider giving people credits for those people who have made real commitments, not just announcements, but real commitments, to build in the U.S,” added the longtime investment banker.

Mnuchin is not on bad terms with Trump or the administration, but it’s telling that he’s willing to point out some of the obvious flaws in Trump’s half-baked economic plan. And only last month he said that “people are overreacting a bit” to the administration’s policy changes.

“I don’t think we’re going to have a recession. I don’t think the outlook looks like we’re going to have a recession. And Larry Summers saying there’s a 50 percent probability, I just don’t agree with that,” Mnuchin said on CNBC at the time, referring to comments from another former Treasury head. The interview is a window into the way Mnuchin, who was widely seen as one of the “adults in the room” during his first term, likely approached the president when he served as his treasury secretary: as a toddler.

While Mnuchin didn’t mention a recession in Thursday’s interview, it’s clear he’s now worried about Trump’s actions and is hoping that, from behind a TV screen, Trump might see some sense with a very mild recommendation. Maybe he should be overreacting now.

In the topsy-turvy world of the Trump administration, market panic and financial suffering are somehow good things.

The president unveiled his economic agenda on Wednesday, revealing steep tariff hikes on practically every country in the world—regardless of whether the U.S. is running a trade deficit or surplus there.

The news sent markets reeling. But by Thursday morning, Donald Trump was still celebrating his plan.

“THE OPERATION IS OVER! THE PATIENT LIVED, AND IS HEALING,” Trump posted on Truth Social. “THE PROGNOSIS IS THAT THE PATIENT WILL BE FAR STRONGER, BIGGER, BETTER, AND MORE RESILIENT THAN EVER BEFORE. MAKE AMERICA GREAT AGAIN!!!”

But it’s unclear what metrics—if any—Trump used to measure his success.

In reality, American businesses were seriously disturbed. The blue chip Dow Jones Industrial Average plunged by 1,500 points, about 3.5 percent, while the S&P 500 sank by 3.9 percent, setting both on pace for their worst day since the 2022 inflation crisis. The Nasdaq Composite tanked by more than 5 percent—bringing it down by 17 percent from its all-time high and down 13 percent year-to-date, the index’s worst performance since March 2020.

Stock futures similarly plummeted. The value of the U.S. dollar dropped, and the price for a troy ounce of gold skyrocketed.

Overnight, some of the country’s most competitive companies lost hundreds of billions of dollars. Nike and Lululemon, whose business models rely on international manufacturing deals in China and Vietnam, each lost more than 10 percent. Big-box stores also saw prominent losses: Best Buy, Target, and Home Depot lost 5 percent.

The tech industry was similarly shaken: Apple was down 9 percent (worth approximately $300 billion in market value), Alphabet by 4 percent, Amazon by 7 percent, Meta by 7 percent, Microsoft by 3 percent, and Nvidia by 6 percent.

Stores that rely heavily on imported goods saw their stocks tank too. Five Below lost 29 percent, Dollar Tree fell by 8 percent, and the Gap suffered a 22 percent loss.

“The macro does not make sense, but the level of chaos and uncertainty, coupled with revaluing highly overpriced stocks, is hitting hard,” assessed CNBC analyst Ron Insana on Thursday.

In a note to investors, JP Morgan said that Trump’s tariffs had a 40 percent chance of slingshotting the U.S. economy into a recession. JP Morgan underscored that the tariffs would cause a price surge—adding 2 percent to the consumer price index—and additionally raise taxes on Americans by $660 billion a year, “the largest tax increase in recent memory by a long shot,” reported CNN.

“The impact on inflation will be substantial,” the analysts said, according to CNN. “We view the full implementation of these policies as a substantial macroeconomic shock.”

A judge has ordered the Trump administration to release a man whom it wrongly detained and planned to deport to El Salvador.

In a brief one-page filing overnight Wednesday, U.S. District Judge Rolando Olvera ordered that the government not only release Adrian Gil Rojas but that it buy him a ticket from Brownsville, Texas, back to New York.

“The Court holds that the Petitioner is a Venezuelan national with a valid Temporary Protected Status and was wrongfully detained,” Olvera wrote.

“The Court further holds that Respondents produced no evidence that Petitioner is a danger to the public,” he added.

The government had argued that it should be allowed to detain and deport Gil Rojas because his TPS was set to expire on April 2, but his lawyer insisted that he was in the process of reopening his immigration case and that there was reason to believe that the Trump administration’s efforts to repeal TPS would fail.

The lawyer was right: On Monday, a San Francisco judge blocked the government from revoking the protected status of about 350,000 Venezuelans. Judge Edward Chen slammed Homeland Secretary Kristi Noem for making “sweeping negative generalizations about Venezuelan TPS beneficiaries.”

“Acting on the basis of a negative group stereotype and generalizing such stereotype to the entire group is the classic example of racism,” Chen said in his order.

Gil Rojas, who said that he was arrested in New York last month, had been one of dozens of Venezuelan nationals detained by ICE who were sneakily moved closer and closer to an airfield in Harlingen, Texas, where the government staged a mass deportation to a notorious torture prison in El Salvador.

On March 14, the plane that was supposed to take Gil Rojas suffered a mechanical issue and was rescheduled for the following day, giving his lawyer enough time to get Olvera to issue an order blocking his immediate removal. Gil Rojas was spared, unlike the dozens of others for whom due process was suspended under Donald Trump’s invocation of the Alien Enemies Act, a wartime law he has reappropriated to aid in his mass deportation efforts.

Olvera said that when Gil Rojas was returned to New York, he should be released on his own recognizance, and recommended that he wear an ankle monitor while his immigration case was pending.

Earlier this week, the Trump administration admitted that it had wrongly deported Kilmer Armado Abrego Garcia, a Salvadoran national who had been granted protected status from being sent back to El Salvador. The government blamed an “administrative error,” and a judge ruled that the man could not be returned to the U.S. because the court lacked jurisdiction now that he was out of U.S. custody.

Evidence that the government expedited the deportation of individuals who, as Olvera put it, were not a “danger to the public” only continues to mount. The government revealed that it had heavily relied on the tattoos to identify members of Tren de Aragua, a Venezuelan gang the U.S. government has deemed a terrorist group, for deportation. But experts on the gang say that there are no tattoos that signify TdA affiliation.

When Democrats attacked the Trump administration for the gargantuan price of eggs, the administration responded by importing vast quantities from Turkey and South Korea—two countries that were hit hard by the tariffs imposed on Wednesday. 

When asked about the issue, Agriculture Secretary Brooke Rollins had no definitive answer on whether those imported eggs would be tariffed, reinforcing the multiple contradictions at the center of Trump’s isolationist trade war in the process. 

“President Trump yesterday gave you much praise talking about the job you’ve done in the last month and a half. I wanna talk about what you’ve done with eggs,” Fox Business’s Maria Bartiromo asked Rollins on Thursday. “National egg prices have declined 9 percent from last week, now averaging $3 a dozen, according to the USDA. Secretary … are eggs gonna be tariffed?” 

“Well, so, yeah let’s pivot to eggs.… Listen, we rolled out a very bold plan about a month ago.… Obviously it’s his vision we’re effectuating. The market reacted very favorably to it, [it] included some short-term imports but also included helping our poultry farmers in America,” Rollins answered, avoiding the question. “So as we repopulate our chicken farms and our egg-laying farms, I think we’ll see the price coming down even more.… Only good news on the egg front, and hopefully it will hold.”

“So where are the eggs coming from that you’re importing?” Bartiromo asked. 

“Well, we’re importing from Turkey, we’re importing from South Korea, to a few other countries right now,” Rollins responded. “But again, at the end of the day. once our farms are repopulated … then we’ll go back to pretty much using all American-lain eggs.”

“So then that means that eggs will be tariffed, if you’re taking them from Turkey, right? That’s part of the tariff plan,” Bartiromo pushed. There will be a 10 percent tariff on Turkey, according to Trump’s “Liberation Day” announcement.  

“Well, yes, all to be determined,” Rollins replied, refusing to commit. ‘We’re all at negotiations, but yes, that’s a possibility.” 

Lower grocery prices—and lower prices in general—were a central theme of Trump’s campaign. Trump himself riffed on it at his “Liberation Day” announcement. But the new tariffs go directly against those promises, and even his inner circle are struggling to find a way to explain themselves.

Got a problem with the Trump administration? Good luck.

Recently laid-off employees from the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services were told to contact Anita Pinder, the former director at the agency’s Office of Equal Opportunity and Civil Rights, with any complaints. A notice informed severed workers that they had 45 calendar days to contact Pinder following their termination date, listing Pinder’s name, email, and phone number.

But those who knew Pinder said the directive came as a “gut punch,” according to The Washington Post, since Pinder died last year.

“They couldn’t have run it past the people at CMS that were at the funeral and knew she died,” Karen Shields, one of Pinder’s former co-workers, told the Post. “This is a lack of communication. There is just a better way to do this.”

Shields told the newspaper that it “pained” her to see Pinder’s name used in the reduction-in-force notices.

“She would have been someone, even though her job would have been on the chopping block, she would have helped,” Shields said.

The negligent error is just one recent instance in which the “shock and awe” of the Trump administration’s federal makeover has resulted in dud details and mass confusion.

At the Food and Drug Administration, fired staffers were instructed to contact an Office of Equal Employment Opportunity employee that had left the agency more than a month ago, the Post reported.

So far, the Trump administration—directed by Elon Musk’s Department of Government Efficiency—has fired more than 100,000 federal employees. But tens of thousands more government jobs are expected to be on the chopping block as Trump pursues a second round of “voluntary” buyouts.

More than 10,000 jobs are expected to be cut at the Department of Health and Human Services, which encompasses the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. HHS Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. has proposed downsizing the agency’s 82,000-person workforce by nearly a quarter.

A new Gallup poll shows that Americans are much more worried about Social Security and the economy.

The poll, which measured opinions from March 3 to March 16, said that concern about the Social Security system is at a 15-year high, with 52 percent of Americans worried about it a “great deal.” Also ranking high were the economy at 60 percent, health care costs at 59 percent, and inflation at 56 percent.

The worries reflect the Trump administration’s actions over the past few months, with cuts made to the Social Security Administration and the whiplash over the president’s bizarre tariff decisions. Those fears may get worse, as Trump went ahead with instituting aggressive tariffs against countries across the world on Wednesday, calling it “Liberation Day.” Meanwhile, Elon Musk, who is overseeing much of the administration’s policy, has called Social Security “the biggest Ponzi scheme of all time.”

Markets have already plummeted Thursday, and criticism of the tariffs have even come within the Republican Party. Cuts to the Social Security Administration threaten to cause interruptions to benefits for 73 million retired workers, their survivors, and poor and disabled Americans. Last month, Martin O’Malley, who headed the SSA under President Biden, warned that the cuts could result in the agency missing payments for the first time in its 80-year history.

It’s no surprise that the last time worries about Social Security were this high, the country was in the midst of a recession brought about by the financial crisis of 2008. The difference between now and then is that these worries are brought about by self-inflicted crises. Neither the SSA or the economy were in trouble prior to Trump’s inauguration. If the president continues on its current course, these worries could evolve into full-blown panic over losing Social Security and an even worse recession.