Top Trump Aides Grapple With Internal Scuffles Between Elon Musk and Staffers Over ‘What Did You Do Last Week?’ Email: Report
Jose Luis Magana/AP photos
Senior Trump administration staffers are frustrated by Elon Musk days after his controversial “What did you do last week?” email hit federal workers’ inboxes, leaving officials blindsided.
The Trump administration believed cooperation between Musk and senior officials was friendly, but that all changed with the release of Saturday’s email, which asked federal employees to list five things they had accomplished over the past week, Reuters reported, citing staffers familiar with the scuffles.
Despite a request by White House Chief of Staff Susie Wiles to keep her informed about activities within the Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE), Musk reportedly went rogue and utilized the administration’s Office of Personnel Management to send the email without informing Trump’s cabinet, according to Reuters sources.
One of the officials cited by Reuters added that President Donald Trump himself did not sign off on the email, but “likes letting Elon be Elon.”
White House spokeswoman Karoline Leavitt rejected the Reuters report, telling the news service their sources are “wrong” and that the “White House was not caught off guard,” saying that Trump was told about Musk’s email idea and had OK’d it.
That sentiment was echoed by Musk himself, who told Trump’s Cabinet members during their first meeting Wednesday that he asked Trump if his team could “send out an email to everyone, just saying: ‘What did you get done last week?’ The president said yes. So, I did that.”
On Monday, Musk conceded that federal employees who failed to reply to his cross-agency productivity audit email issued Saturday would be given “another chance” at Trump’s “discretion” — but warned that next time, ignoring the email would “result in termination.”
The announcement and threat, however, caused widespread chaos and confusion across federal agencies, including the FBI, where newly appointed director Kash Patel advised employees not to comply with the email.
“FBI personnel may have received an email from OPM requesting information,” Patel wrote in a memo. “The FBI, through the Office of the Director, is in charge of all of our review processes… For now, please pause any responses.”
The Reuters report came after 21 DOGE staffers opted to resign rather than “dismantle critical public services,” the Associated Press reported Tuesday.
“We swore to serve the American people and uphold our oath to the Constitution across presidential administrations,” the workers wrote in a joint resignation letter obtained by the Associated Press. “However, it has become clear that we can no longer honor those commitments.”
