An unlikely duo appeared at the intersection of business and politics: Elon Musk and Senator Bernie Sanders. The independent representative from Vermont, who is rallying with the Democratic Party, announced on Sunday at X he thinks Musk has something right about the US budget.
“Elon Musk is right,” Sanders said in one X post December 1. “The Pentagon, with a budget of $886 billion, just failed its 7th audit in a row. Lost track of the billions.”
Although billed as an independent, Sanders, an 83-year-old longtime politician, is a proponent of progressive policies—namely, universal health care and free college education. He has also advocated federal budget reform for years, with a strong focus on cutting the defense budget, which is almost 850 billion dollars by 2025according to the US Department of Defense.
Elon Musk is right.
The Pentagon, with a budget of $886 billion, just failed its seventh consecutive audit. Billions have been lost.
Last year, only 13 senators voted against the military-industrial complex and the defense budget full of waste and fraud.
That has to change.
— Bernie Sanders (@SenSanders) December 1, 2024
Sanders supports directing federal funds instead to “huge crises” such as climate change, health care, education and housing, arguing that “more military spending is unnecessary,” he wrote in 2023 op-ed he announced The Guardian.
Musk, on the other hand, also supports a review of the defense budget, but for different reasons. The Tesla X’s CEO and owner became cozy with President-elect Donald Trump and was tapped to co-lead Department of Government Effective (aptly abbreviated as DOGE), along with entrepreneur and Republican presidential candidate Vivek Ramaswamy.
Representatives for Sanders and Musk did not immediately respond Wealthrequests for comment.
Trump said DOGE will help his administration “dismantle government bureaucracy, reduce redundant regulations, cut unnecessary costs and restructure federal agencies critical to the ‘Save America’ movement.
Although the president-elect did not say what specific areas of federal spending DOGE would target, the new department plans to cut $2 trillion from the federal budget. And Musk has been vocal about some of the Defense Department’s downfalls.
“Some idiots are still building manned fighter jets like the F-35,” Musk said in X post November 24. “Manned fighter jets are obsolete in the age of drones and only endanger the lives of the pilots.” These sentiments are reminiscent of Musk’s feelings about autonomous vehicles, which he expects to be driving bane as we know it.
Meanwhile, some idiots are still building manned fighter jets like the F-35 🗑️ 🫠
pic.twitter.com/4JX27qcxz1— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) November 24, 2024
“A lot of car companies or most car companies haven’t internalized that, which is surprising because we’ve been shouting it from the rooftops for so long, and it’s going to accumulate to their detriment going forward,” Musk said during Tesla’s third-quarter earnings call late October, shortly after the company announced its autonomous robotaxis, Cybercab.
Musk also hinted in late November that he wanted to explore DOD funding after California Democratic Rep. Ro Khanna suggested the defense budget could become a bipartisan issue.
“When it comes to reducing waste, fraud and abuse and opening up the 5 primary seats to more competition, there are Democrats (Armed Services Committee) who will work with @elonmusk and @DOGE,” Khanna said in interview with CNN.
“Cool!” Musk answered on Khanna’s X post.
cool! https://t.co/5WiVyOHAw6
— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) November 25, 2024
Sanders is hoping for more bipartisan cooperation on reducing defense spending in Congress, given the repeated failures of the DOD audit.
“Last year, only 13 senators voted against the Military Industrial Complex and a defense budget full of waste and fraud,” Sanders wrote in a post X. “That has to change.”
In mid-November DOD published a statement acknowledging the repeated reviews, but Michael McCord, deputy secretary of defense (Comptroller) and chief financial officer of the Department of Justice, said that “the Department has turned a corner in its understanding of the depth and breadth of its challenges.”
“Significant work remains and challenges lie ahead,” McCord said in a statement. “But our annual audit continues to be a catalyst for financial management reform across the Department, resulting in greater financial integrity, transparency and better support for warfighters.”
