Pushback to Latest DOGE Demand May Signal Limits for Elon Musk

A clash over Musk’s latest missive

Monday could bring a standoff between Elon Musk and huge swaths of the federal government, including Trump-appointed agency leaders.

The fate of the latest example of Musk’s brutal management style — having government workers justify their employment by midnight or risk being fired — may reveal the limits of President Trump’s cost-cutter-in-chief’s efforts.

“For now, please pause any response,” a top Pentagon official told employees this weekend, adding that the Defense Department “will conduct any review in accordance with its own procedures.” Similar messages went out from Tulsi Gabbard, the director of national intelligence; Kash Patel, the director of the F.B.I.; the State Department; and more.

What’s notable is that Trump loyalists lead many of those organizations. But The Times reports that many agency leaders are “tired of having to justify specific intricacies of agency policy and having to scramble to address unforeseen controversies” raised by Musk, especially after the billionaire’s so-called Department of Government Efficiency gained unprecedented access to government systems.

It raises the prospect that the Musk approach has its limits. Yes, Musk made a similar move at the social network once known as Twitter. But the federal bureaucracy moves much more slowly than a private company — and has unions who can push back.

The president of the American Federation of Government Employees, the largest such union, declared Musk’s missive “plainly unlawful” and added that the Office of Personnel and Management was being directed by “the unelected and unhinged Elon Musk.”