GOP Leader Suggests Elon Musk Take a Step Back at DOGE in Gentle Rebuke on CNN: ‘Hand It Off’
Senate Majority Leader John Thune (R-SD) gently rebuked Elon Musk over his actions at DOGE on CNN Tuesday, reminding him that federal workers are “real people” and “need to be treated that way.”
Musk has been praised by those who see him as bringing accountability to the government but also criticism from those who believe he has been unnecessarily cruel and demeaning in his new perch.
On Tuesday, CNN’s Dana Bash asked Thune what he thought about Musk’s performance so far:
BASH: I want to ask about Elon Musk. Our understanding is that he is going to be at the speech tonight, the president plans to highlight him and his work. No one argues that there isn’t waste, fraud and abuse, probably more extensive than anybody knows in the government. But you’ve seen these cuts. They’ve been pretty chaotic on a whole host of issues they’ve had-, they fired people and they realized that they were the wrong people. And in areas that aren’t just about soft power, but are also about like the national security of America. Are you comfortable with how he is going about business, he being Elon Musk?
THUNE: Well, I think that he’s kind of going about business as he would in a private business. And obviously there are nuances in dealing with the federal government that are probably different than what he’s accustomed to in the private world. But I do think he’s bringing, you know, a view of this, that a lot of people around this country welcome. And that is, you know, most of, at least the people in our supporters, a lot of our supporters across the country believe in a limited, but effective federal government, not a bloated bureaucracy. And I think what he is trying to achieve is to try and figure out ways that we can make government cost less, run more efficiently, modernize it with technology. And I think those are-, the objectives are right. How they go about it matters, as you point out.
BASH: And are they going about it right?
THUNE: Well, I mean, frankly what I would do, I think he’s-, the DOGE is going about this and doing the big scrub. But now that you’ve got-, this is why we worked so hard to get Cabinet people in place, is hand it off to these leaders, these managers who are going to be making decisions. And they’re going to be, I think, probably better attuned-
BASH: Do you feel that-, s he going to do that? Have you met with him, and do you intend to meet with him to make that suggestion?
THUNE: Well, I have met with him. I haven’t met with him recently, but I expect to here in the near future. And I think that’s a conversation that we’ll have. And I think that, you know, obviously, as I said, the overall goals and objectives are the right ones. And I think he brings an eye to this, that probably, you know, we-, you couldn’t have gotten just by having sort of the Congress or somebody else do it. I think having somebody who has created jobs, changed and transformed businesses in the real world is a useful perspective and a scrub of our federal government that we haven’t seen in a long time, frankly, was overdue. So I am hopeful it yields the right result. But there are, anytime you do this, it’s you know, you also have to pay attention to the aftermath of that and how it impacts people. I mean, these are real people and they need to be treated that way.
Watch above via CNN.
