Elon Musk vows to create 'crusaders' team of 'sharpest minds in America' to cut Trump's spending

Tech billionaire Elon Musk has vowed to assemble the 'sharpest minds in America' and create a team of 'crusaders' to make sweeping changes to government departments

Elon Musk has vowed to create a "crusaders" team of the "sharpest minds in America" to cut down on Donald Trump's spending.

The tech billionaire was confirmed as part of Trump's cabinet following the latter's election win earlier this month. He will head up the newly formed Department of Government Efficiency alongside Vivek Ramaswamy as the pair set out to "cut the federal government down to size."

Writing of his plan alongside co-head Ramaswamy, Musk revealed the team will cut costs and are already identifying parts of the government that will be cut once their time in office begins. The pair has since revealed three main aims of their focus, with the "regulatory rescissions, administrative reductions and cost savings" all part of the project.

Musk has already outlined the two "critical" Supreme Court rulings his department will target, with the West Virginia v. Environmental Protection Agency (2022) and Loper Bright v. Raimondo (2024) both set to be reviewed. He and Ramaswamy claimed: "Together, these cases suggest that a plethora of current federal regulations exceed the authority Congress has granted under the law."

The new department will then work with legal experts "embedded in government agencies" and "apply these rulings to federal regulations". Sweeping changes in the government departments come as Musk and Ramaswamy say they will be equipped with a team featuring the "sharpest minds in America."

They wrote: "We are assisting the Trump transition team to identify and hire a lean team of small-government crusaders, including some of the sharpest technical and legal minds in America. This team will work in the new administration closely with the White House Office of Management and Budget."

But it does not seem like Musk and Ramaswamy will be in the job all that long as they set a project deadline and subsequent dissolution of their department by July 4, 2026, Wall Street Journal reported. Their plan for "structural reductions in the federal government," will have just shy of two years to make an impact as they hope to line up their project's end with the 250th anniversary of the nation.

Efficiency guru Musk, who is CEO of car company Tesla, social media platform Twitter/X, and interplanetary exploration firm SpaceX, had previously called on people to do the only thing that can stop "humanity from dying with a whimper," The Mirror previously reported.

Musk revealed himself as a fan of the large family dynamic, with the father of 12 suggesting more people across the world should be looking to have an increasing number of kids. He had said: "Just have kids one way or another or humanity will die with a whimper in adult diapers... I'm doing my best to encourage more people to become parents and ideally have three or more kids, so humanity can grow."