‘Minister’ Elon Musk promised to save $2 trillion in the budget but ended up spending an additional $135 billion just because of a habit at Tesla

Elon Musk is leaving DOGE, leaving behind a mess of lawsuits, compensation and a promise that has only been fulfilled by 8%.

The New York Times (NYT) reported that Elon Musk once pledged to save $2 trillion in the US budget when he joined the Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE). But that figure has been reduced to $1 trillion and so far, DOGE has said it has saved only $150 billion.

This is only 15% of the $1 trillion target and 8% of the original $2 trillion plan. Even compared to the nearly $7 trillion federal budget for fiscal year 2024, it is too small.

To make matters worse, the NYT said that the federal budget will cost an additional $135 billion for the damages caused by DOGE’s layoffs and closures of agencies, including compensation, staff rehires and damages caused by personnel fluctuations.

The main reason is that instead of the usual dismissal as prescribed, DOGE demands immediate dismissal, just like Elon Musk did at Tesla or Twitter, creating unnecessary litigation and compensation.

$135 billion

The nonprofit organization PPS said that the layoffs, rehiring, loss of productivity and paid leave of thousands of federal employees will cost the US budget an additional $135 billion in fiscal year 2025.

Data from Yale University research shows that the Internal Revenue Service (IRS) alone will have to spend $8.5 billion on the cost of cutting 22,000 employees initiated by DOGE. The total number of civil servants fired could even reach 32,000.

There is still no specific estimate of the damage caused by DOGE’s proposed layoff programs. Of the roughly 200 lawsuits and appeals related to the government agenda, at least 30 are related to DOGE.

“Elon Musk is not only overinflating the budget money he has saved, but also failing to take into account the exponentially greater waste he is creating,” PPS CEO Max Stier said.

The NYT said that DOGE’s layoffs would not have been so expensive if it weren’t for Elon Musk’s habit of firing at Tesla or Twitter.

Federal law and previous government shutdowns have provided a complete firing process for Elon Musk, but the billionaire opted for the quick, aggressive methods he used at Twitter after acquiring the company in 2022.

“The law is very clear,” said Jeri Buchholz, who has worked in the public service, handling hiring and firing at seven federal agencies for 30 years.

DOGE’s cuts have targeted at at least 12% of the 2.4 million civilian employees in the federal workforce.

But the irony is that according to the Office of Human Resources Management (OPM), the U.S. government had to rehire a quarter of the 100,000 federal employees who were laid off in the first round.

Most of these cases were ruled by the court to be illegal dismissals that required the government to pay compensation, accompanied by full pay for the rest period.

There have even been cases where DOGE has to apologize for firing the wrong expert related to nuclear programs.

Subsequently, the layoffs of 10,000 employees at the Department of Health and Human Services wiped out most of the groups of doctors at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC). The doctors here have been surprised because their work has always received support from both Democrats and Republicans.

The NYT said that in a recent poll, about 58% of those surveyed said they disapproved of Elon Musk’s handling of DOGE’s affairs and 60% disapproved of the billionaire himself.

“We will make mistakes”

In February 2025, Elon Musk had to apologize after the Court found that the billionaire’s attempt to remove the US Agency for International Development (USAID) was unconstitutional.

“We will make mistakes,” billionaire Elon Musk admitted.

However, these are not the only mistakes that Elon Musk and the DOGE Department have made.

Going back to the case of wrongly firing nuclear specialists, of the 130 people fired, at least 27 were engineers, 13 were program or project analysts, 12 were program or project managers, and five were physicists or scientists.

In particular, four of these employees are experts in handling the safe transportation of nuclear materials and half a dozen work in the agency unit that builds reactors for nuclear submarines.

“Those are very difficult jobs to fill, because people can make more or more money working for the plant or the lab itself,” said former National Nuclear Security Administration (NNSA) chief Jill Hruby.

In the same vein, PPS CEO Stier said that many good professionals refuse to work for the private sector to serve the government, but when they are dissatisfied, it is very easy to move on to another better job and it is difficult to rehire.

Not stopping there, DOGE’s targeting of 220,000 probationary civil servants is also said to be flawed because many of them are experts recruited to replace people who are about to retire.

The cost of recruiting and training these professionals is up to 10,000 USD for an office civil servant and more than 1 million USD for an elite professional.

On March 13, 2025, about 24,000 probationary civil servants at nearly 20 agencies were fired by DOGE, but the Court found this illegal, ordering them to be rehired.

However, the White House has appealed and the legal battle is still ongoing.

The irony is that while waiting for the verdict, the government still has to pay an average of $106,000 to these people even if they stay at home.

Obviously, Elon Musk is in trouble with DOGE but instead of staying to solve it, this billionaire returned to run Tesla which is in poor business condition, leaving a mess for the government.

*Source: NYT
Tesla is actually losing $13 million from electric vehicle sales, something that hasn’t happened in the past five years