Musk Fails on Deficit
Author: Greg Valliere
May 28, 2025
JUST A FEW MONTHS AGO, ELON MUSK exploded onto the Washington scene, vowing to cut at least $2 trillion from the budget over the next ten years. He failed.
IN AN INTERVIEW TO BE AIRED ON CBS this weekend, Musk places much of the blame on Donald Trump’s “Big Beautiful Bill,” which turns out to be little more than a marketing slogan. The bill will add roughly $4 to $4.5 trillion to the deficit over ten years.
MUSK TOLD CBS he’s “disappointed” with Trump’s massive bill. “I think a bill can be big or it can be beautiful, but I don’t know if it can be both. My personal opinion.”
“I was disappointed to see the massive spending bill, frankly, which increases the deficit, not just decreases it, and undermines the work that the DOGE team is doing,” Musk says.
MUSK LAUNCHED DOGE with a promise of $2 trillion in savings. It has hollowed out or shut down 11 federal agencies and about 250,000 federal workers have left their jobs. This has saved a modest amount by Washington standards — about $160 billion.
THIS HAS OUTRAGED fiscal hawks, who will take the fight to the Senate this summer. Led by Wisconsin conservative Ron Johnson, these hawks are determined to kill the bill that narrowly passed in the House last week.
BUT SOMETHING CLOSE TO THAT BILL will have to pass later this year, because it contains an extension of the debt ceiling, which has to be passed to avoid a government shutdown.
THE DEFICIT HAWKS have vowed to sharply reduce the deficit, but it will increase because members of Congress are terrified to cut entitlements. Their only hope is to slow the rate or growth.
THERE ARE ONLY TWO PLAUSIBLE OPTIONS: Find a way to boost revenues, which would require stronger economic growth or tariff growth, or impose an across-the-board spending freeze with virtually no tax cuts.
TOTAL U.S. DEBT IS ABOUT TO HIT $37 TRILLION, with red ink probably in the $1.5 trillion neighborhood this year alone; it was $1.8 trillion last year. Experts shudder to contemplate a recession or slowdown, which would dramatically boost the deficit.
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