Lawrence O’Donnell flipped the script on Donald Trump’s appointment of Elon Musk to the not-yet-officially-existent Department of Government Efficiency, with the bitterly anti-Trump MSNBC anchor calling it not a promotion – but a “humiliating demotion” for the X owner and Tesla CEO.
“Donald Trump announced he would give Elon Musk a job that does not exist and will last, at most, 18 months,” O’Donnell said Tuesday night.” Worst of all, Elon Musk, the richest person in the world, was assigned a working partner who, like Musk, has never worked in government before: Vivek Ramaswamy, who isn’t even a billionaire.”
O’Donnell didn’t clarify why Ramaswamy’s relative wealth was relevant, but also mocked Musk for not getting “his own press release from Donald Trump,” noting that he had to “share” it with the millionaire.
“Musk got the first shared press release of any of Donald Trump’s appointment announcements,” O’Donnell said. “Even [Pete Hegseth], who isn’t even the richest person at Fox, got his own press release … That’s right, a Fox weekend morning host for Secretary of Defense.”
O’Donnell’s show was taped before Trump announced cabinet nominations Wednesday for Tulsi Gabbard, Marco Rubio and Matt Gaetz, calling Tuesday the “silliest day yet in Trump personnel announcements.” He also noted that his other cabinet appointments have been for standing federal departments – while DOGE is not.
“Leading a department in American government makes you a Cabinet secretary,” the legal pundit explained. “The Department of Defense is led by the Secretary of Defense, the Department of the Treasury by the Secretary of the Treasury, and so on. Creating such a department would require an act of Congress and a budget … the Department of Government Efficiency, which does not have an office, desk or office chair anywhere in government, will likely be housed in the Executive Office Building beside the White House … this could mean Musk will be allowed to send budget ideas to the yet-unnamed director of [the budget office], a real White House job.”
O’Donnell then made his prediction of a short, Musk-led DOGE regime: “If all goes well for personnel in the Trump administration — unlike the last one — Elon Musk will be the first one kicked out because Trump already kicked him out in the press release announcing his appointment to a non-existent job.”
In the initial announcement Trump insisted the DOGE program would conclude its work by July 4, 2026. Musk seemed at least sanguine about getting the job done in that time.
Watch the entire MSNBC video, above.
