Donald Trump’s shadow president Elon Musk is finally leaving Washington after promising (and failing) to fight fraud. Musk’s only public record of so-called “savings” is riddled with inaccurate information, mistakes, and inflated numbers. While gutting access to working families’ hard-earned benefits, Musk’s net worth skyrocketed. Make no mistake: Trump and Musk only care about lining their own pockets at the expense of the American people. 

FACT: Elon Musk took a “wrecking ball” to the Social Security Administration, threatening hard-earned benefits for millions of Americans amid a 50-year low on staffing.

New York Times: “‘Just a Mess’: Staff Cuts, Rushed Changes and Anxiety at Social Security”

Axios: “DOGE is taking its wrecking ball to the Social Security Administration, the agency responsible for overseeing retirement and disability benefits for 73 million Americans. …

“The agency announced last month it seeks to cut about 7,000 employees, or 12% of staff, through voluntary resignations and a reduction-in-force plan due Thursday.”

Washington Post: “Long waits, waves of calls, website crashes: Social Security is breaking down”

“The Social Security Administration website crashed four times in 10 days this month because the servers were overloaded, blocking millions of retirees and disabled Americans from logging in to their online accounts. In the field, office managers have resorted to answering phones in place of receptionists because so many employees have been pushed out. Amid all this, the agency no longer has a system to monitor customer experience because that office was eliminated as part of the cost-cutting efforts led by Elon Musk.”

FACT: After Musk funneled millions into Trump’s campaign, he was rewarded with billions in federal contracts and his net worth skyrocketed. 

Daily Mail: “The federal government awarded Elon Musk’s company a $38.85 million contract on Monday as the billionaire works to slash other contracts.”

New York Times: “Mr. Musk’s companies secured $13 billion in contracts over the past five years, making SpaceX, which collects most of that money, one of the biggest government contractors. There is already talk during the Trump administration of expanding these deals, particularly at the Air Force.”

Benzinga: “By mid-December, Musk’s fortune had jumped from $262 billion before the election to a peak of $486 billion, according to the Bloomberg Billionaires Index, fueled by a massive surge in Tesla (NASDAQ:TSLA) stock.”

Washington Post: “Less than two weeks after President Donald Trump announced 50 percent tariffs on goods from the tiny African nation of Lesotho, the country’s communications regulator held a meeting with representatives of Starlink. …

“A series of internal government messages obtained by The Post reveal how U.S. embassies and the State Department have pushed nations to clear hurdles for U.S. satellite companies, often mentioning Starlink by name.”

FACT: Musk repeatedly overinflated DOGE’s “receipts” about actual savings and efficiency. 

CBS: “DOGE continues to publish misleading or inaccurate claims on its ‘Wall of Receipts’”

“According to the running tally on its website, DOGE claims it has saved American taxpayers a total of $170 billion. However, only $70.9 billion is itemized, and many of those entries continue to raise serious doubts about their accuracy.”

New York Times: “DOGE’s Only Public Ledger Is Riddled With Mistakes”

“[T]he math that could back up those checks is marred with accounting errors, incorrect assumptions, outdated data and other mistakes, according to a New York Times analysis of all the contracts listed … its slapdash accounting adds to a pattern of recklessness by the group, which has recently gained access to sensitive government payment systems.”

New York Times: “Struggling With Errors, DOGE Deletes Billions More From List of Savings”

“Elon Musk’s Department of Government Efficiency has deleted hundreds more claims from its mistake-plagued ‘wall of receipts,’ erasing $4 billion in additional savings that the group said it had made for U.S. taxpayers.

“Late Sunday night, the group erased or altered more than 1,000 contracts it had claimed to cancel, representing more than 40 percent of all the contracts listed on its site last week. The deleted items included five of the seven largest savings that it had claimed credit for just last week. At the same time, the group added about 1,000 additional canceled contracts, worth smaller total savings.”