Trump announces “Department of Government Efficiency” and that Elon Musk will have a position

() –– President-elect Donald Trump announced that Elon Musk and Vivek Ramaswamy will lead the new “Department of Government Efficiency.”

“Together, these two wonderful Americans will pave the way for my administration to dismantle government bureaucracy, reduce overregulation, reduce wasteful spending, and restructure federal agencies,” Trump said in a statement.

The announcement by Ramaswamy and particularly Musk, who runs companies with lucrative existing government contracts, raises immediate questions about potential conflicts of interest. And it’s not immediately clear how the department, which Trump said will “provide advice and guidance from outside the government,” will operate.

Trump had proposed creating a government efficiency commission as part of a series of new economic plans he unveiled in early September. At the time, he said Musk had agreed to lead him if he wanted to return to the White House.

Trump’s statement Tuesday night quoted Musk as saying that “this will send shock waves through the system and to anyone involved in government waste, which is a lot of people!”

Ramaswamy responded separately in

Ramaswamy, who previously challenged Trump in the Republican presidential primary before endorsing him in January, made reducing waste in government spending a key political platform for his campaign.

Last year, Ramaswamy – who had promised during the election campaign to eliminate the FBI, the Department of Education and the Nuclear Regulatory Commission, laying off thousands of federal workers in the process – published a white paper outlining a legal framework that, he said, allowing the president to eliminate federal agencies of his choice.

News in development…