Donald Trump, during a joint Fox News interview with Elon Musk Tuesday, made fun of how the young staffers at his Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) dress.
Trump told Fox’s Sean Hannity that Musk had talked to him about the implementation of executive orders, which Trump said was being carried out by the “genius” members of the so-called Department of Government Efficiency.
“This is probably true for all presidents: you write an executive order and you think it’s done. You send it out. [But] it doesn’t get implemented. They don’t implement it. Maybe they’re from the last administration, and they are in some cases. You try to get them out as fast as you can,“ Trump recalled Musk saying. ”As soon as he said that, I said, you know, that’s interesting."
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“What [Musk] does is he takes it and with his hundred geniuses,” Trump said, before going off course. “He’s got some very brilliant young people working for him that dress much worse than him, actually. They dress in T-shirts. You wouldn’t know they have a 180 IQ.”
Earlier in the interview, Musk, who also happened to be wearing a T-shirt under his jacket, showed what was written on it.
“My T-shirt says ‘TECH SUPPORT,’” he said as Trump laughed, “because I’m here to provide the president with technology support.”
Among the young DOGE workers—all of those who have been identified publicly are under 26—is Edward Coristine, 19, who was once fired from an internship after an internal probe found he leaked sensitive information to a competitor.
Another is self-described “internet edgelord” Gavin Kliger, who reportedly posted just last year that Hillary Clinton was “r----ded.” Kliger is working at the Internal Revenue Service for at least four months, CNN reported.
A third member is 25-year-old Marko Elez, who has been working in the Treasury Department. Elez resigned—but was quickly rehired—after racist social media posts came to light, among them “Normalize Indian hate.”
Both Trump and Musk seemed to be on the same page regarding DOGE during the Fox interview, which was largely a love-fest between the two.
In the opening few minutes, Musk declared, “I love the president.”
“I have spent a lot of time with the president, and not once have I seen him do something that was mean or cruel or wrong. Not once,” he claimed.
And Trump said he has “always respected” Musk, who is a “leader.”
“I wanted somebody really smart to work with me in terms of the country,” he added.
