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Trump reins in Musk, announces biweekly DOGE meetings with cabinet: ‘Scalpel rather than the hatchet’
Published
March 6, 2025
Updated
March 6, 2025, 4:46 p.m. ET
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President Trump revealed plans for cabinet secretaries and other high-level administration officials to hold more sway in the Department of Government Efficiency’s push for personnel cuts.
Cabinet officials will meet with DOGE every two weeks until the administration has wrapped up its efforts to revamp the federal workforce, Trump announced, while lauding special government employee Elon Musk’s efforts as “an incredible success.”
“Now that we have my cabinet in place, I have instructed the Secretaries and Leadership to work with DOGE on Cost Cutting measures and Staffing,” Trump announced on Truth Social.
“As the Secretaries learn about and understand the people working for the various Departments, they can be very precise as to who will remain and who will go. “
Throughout the first six weeks of his administration, DOGE has made a dizzying array of sporadic cuts to personnel and programs.
In some instances, the administration has been forced to reverse course on those cuts. Last month, for example, the National Nuclear Security Administration scrambled to rehire regulators that had been let go.
Later in February, the White House undid a roughly 20% cut to staff at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s World Trade Center (WTC) Health Program following an outcry from Staten Island GOP Rep. Nicole Malliotakis and other NYC-area lawmakers.
“We say the ‘scalpel’ rather than the ‘hatchet,’” Trump emphasized in his post. “The combination of them, Elon, DOGE, and other great people will be able to do things at a historic level.”
Trump’s announcement comes on the heels of a closed-door meeting that most cabinet secretaries attended with Musk.
“It was a very positive one,” Trump said of the meeting. “It’s very important that we cut levels down to where they should be, but it’s also important to keep the best and most productive people.”
The president had crowed about some of DOGE’s cost-cutting achievements during his annual presidential address to a joint session of Congress on Tuesday.
Musk later followed up on X and hailed it as a “very productive meeting,” downplaying the fact that the president had seemingly limited his powers. Trump later reiterated to reporters that DOGE has “done an amazing job.”
“I want the cabinet members to keep good people. I don’t want to see a big cut where a lot of good people are cut,” he reiterated to White House reporters on Thursday.
“I want the cabinet members go first, keep all the people you want, everybody that you need,” he added. “I want them to do the best job they can where we have good people, those that’s precious.”
Democrats have pummeled the Trump administration over DOGE’s crusade to trim down the federal bureaucracy — and have touted town hall events in which Republican lawmakers have weathered backlash from their constituents as well as union leaders and Democratic allies.
Despite the blowback, Trump has stood by Musk and mused that critics are trying to pit the two billionaires against one another.
Top brass in the administration had seemed uncomfortable with Musk’s antics at times. Last month, he directed an Office of Personnel and Management (OPM) email to be sent out to government workers, instructing them to list five accomplishments from the prior week.
Numerous secretaries and agency heads initially instructed their workers to refrain from responding, fearing that DOGE may be using replies to make personnel decisions. Musk later claimed that it was merely a “pulse check.”
Musk met with lawmakers on Capitol Hill Wednesday. After the meeting, multiple senators suggested that the tech baron was keen on a rescissions package in which the government would claw back funding.
“It is now time for the White House to put together a rescissions package so that Congress can turn DOGE’s work product into law and save money for the American people,” Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-SC) said after the meeting.
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During those meetings, Musk also acknowledged that DOGE has made mistakes.
“He said you know, there’s going to be mistakes along the way. He has said that publicly before too,” Rep. Russell Fry (R-SC) told CNN. “And then when those are identified, they will be corrected.”
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