Donald Trump has appointed Elon Musk to lead the new ‘Department of Government Efficiency’ (DOGE) alongside former Republican presidential candidate Vivek Ramaswamy.
The Tesla billionaire and X owner has been handed an official position after being teased on social media about his closeness to Trump since he clinched victory in the US election.
According to reports, he is spending “nearly every day” with Trump at his Mar-a-Lago resort in Florida.
Musk has been spotted dining with him on the patio and joining him on the golf course, even though he doesn’t play the sport.
The appointment fulfils a promise Trump made to the tech billionaire after he endorsed him in the race for the White House, and poured more than $119m (£92m) into canvassing for him in the seven battleground states.
In a statement, the president-elect said Musk and Ramaswamy “will pave the way for my administration to dismantle government bureaucracy, slash excess regulations, cut wasteful expenditures, and restructure federal agencies”.
Musk has previously made clear his desire to cut back on “government waste” and in a post on his X platform suggested he could cut as many as three-quarters of the more than 400 federal departments in the US, writing: “99 is enough”.
In a separate post, he wrote: “Threat to democracy? Nope, threat to bureaucracy.”
Related: Professor explains how inheritance tax loophole crippled British farming