In Trump 2.0’s presidency, the Department of Government Efficiency, which didn’t exist until he took office, has been a tale of two narratives. The first is massive public support of the mission, and the other is focused on Elon Musk, the department’s head.
Recent polls underscore this juxtaposition. A CBS News survey released this month shows that 77% of the public support DOGE’s objective. In a country hopelessly divided on most issues, 77% support on anything is insanely high.
“This, to me, was one of the more shocking figures I saw. It made me go, ‘Wait a minute, hold on one second! Whoa!’” CNN pollster Harry Enten exclaimed on the network after analyzing the CBS result.
But despite DOGE’s overwhelming popularity, the number is turned on its head when the polling questions focus solely on Musk.
A March CNN poll shows that 53% of the public hold an unfavorable opinion of Musk, while 35% view him positively. Nine percent had no opinion, while 2% said they’d never heard of him. Other polls reflect similar results.
So what gives? This would be like an NFL team handily winning the Super Bowl but the coach being viewed negatively.
The answer is twofold: First, the Democratic Party. Second, media bias.
On the first front, Democrats have resigned themselves to the realization that President Donald Trump is truly Teflon Don, although they’ll never admit such publicly. Think about what they tried during the campaign.
Two states attempted to take him off the state ballot, Maine and Colorado, but both failed. On the lawfare front, he has 94 felony counts across four cases against him, with all failing or being delayed indefinitely. On countless occasions, Trump has been compared to Hilter, Goebbels, Stalin, Mao, Mussolini, Castro, Chavez, Pol Pot, and Nero. Trump survived two assassination attempts, including one in which a bullet came within an inch of ending his life.
Media coverage continued to be overwhelmingly hostile and negative, to the point of being downright comical. For example, the first 100 stories ABC News did on former Vice President Kamala Harris after she was installed as the Democratic nominee in late July were all positive, according to the Media Research Center. Even the Kremlin doesn’t get that kind of love from Pravda.
Yet despite those headwinds, Teflon Don would go on to win the popular vote, every swing state, and helped Republicans take back the Senate and hold the House. In fact, one could argue that all of these efforts, especially on the lawfare front, only helped him crush Harris and the goofy Gov. Tim Walz (D-MN).
So, with the Democrats and their allies in the media finally understanding that hyperventilating over every Trump action, statement, and Truth Social post was counterproductive, the consultants have turned their attention to Musk, the former darling of the party once heralded as a champion of tackling climate change and saving the planet.
On cue, many in the press have transferred the Hilter/fascist/Nazi label to Musk, who visited Auschwitz just last year to denounce antisemitism under no uncertain terms.
“It was incredibly moving and deeply sad and tragic that humans could do this to other humans,” Musk said of the visit. “I’m a student of history, so I had seen the pictures, I’d seen the videos, but … it hits you much more in the heart when you see it in person.”
Yep. That guy has “Nazi” written all over him.
No matter. Check out these headlines from our unhinged media as if they were given marching orders from the Democratic National Committee.
The Atlantic: “Elon Musk’s Anti-Semitic, Apartheid-Loving Grandfather.” Subheadline: The billionaire has described his grandfather as a risk-taking adventurer. A closer read of history reveals something much darker.
The Los Angeles Times: “Elon Musk’s engagement with the far right on Twitter is out of control.”
The New York Times: “They Loved Their Teslas. Now They’re Too Embarrassed to Drive Them. Fury at Elon Musk emerges as vandalism, protest and buyer’s remorse.”
Ah yes, it’s just vandalism, Old Grey Lady. In Austin just recently, incendiary devices were discovered and removed at one dealership, while others have been shot at. Molotov cocktails have also been a featured component of this mere “vandalism,” otherwise known as firebombing.
Lawmakers such as media “It” girl Rep. Jasmine Crockett (D-TX) have even called on Musk to be “taken out.” Her bookings on cable news and podcasts have skyrocketed as a result.
Regardless of the fact that attacks on Musk have been hyperbolic, dishonest, and dangerous to his personal safety, the messaging needs to be changed around DOGE’s mission.
That’s why the interview with Fox News’s Bret Baier on Thursday night was so important. Until now, almost no voters in the country have seen who is working with Musk and what their perspective on the mammoth task at hand is. The Washington Examiner’s Byron York captured the essence of the Q&A perfectly in real time on X almost immediately following the broadcast.
“Communications has been a big weak spot for the DOGE team. Which is why the @BretBaier group interview was hugely important for them,” York wrote. “Seeing Musk with his top aides brought home the point that these are serious people doing serious work.”
One key part of the discussion revolved around alleged massive layoffs within the federal government at the hands of DOGE.
“There’s voluntary early retirement. There’s voluntary separation payments. We put in place deferred resignation, the eight-month severance program,” DOGE’s Anthony Armstrong said on Thursday, along with Musk and several other members of the team. “So, there’s a very heavy bias towards programs that are long-dated, that are generous, that allow people to exit and go and get a new job in the private sector.”
“You’ve heard a lot of news about people getting fired. At this moment in time, less than 0.15% of the federal workforce has actually been given a [Reduction in Force] notice,” he added.
You heard that correctly: 0.15%. Yet the media continue to use the term “mass firings” to describe what’s happening.
CNN: “Judge halts mass firings of federal workers at some agencies.”
The Associated Press: “Judge finds mass firings of federal probationary workers were likely unlawful.”
Reuters: “Explainer-Are Trump’s Mass Firings of Federal Workers Legal?”
Detecting a pattern here.
“The sheer amount of waste and fraud in the government — it is astonishing, it’s mind-blowing,” Musk told Baier. “We routinely encounter wastes of a billion dollars or more, casually.”
“For example, like the simple survey that was literally [a] 10-question survey. You could do it with SurveyMonkey, [which] would cost about $10,000. The government was being charged almost a billion dollars for that,” he explained.
“We want to reduce spending by eliminating waste and fraud and reduce the spending by 15%, which seems really quite achievable,” Musk noted before adding, “We feel confident that a 15% reduction can be done without affecting any of the critical government services.”
Musk will still be the face of DOGE. But like Trump, who will always be the preeminent face of the current administration — unlike former President Joe Biden, who was rarely seen, making former White House press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre the face of the previous team — it would be wise to have Musk’s lieutenants, his musketeers, all over the dial and on podcasts as well.
EVEN AFTER MISSTEPS AND DEMOCRATIC ATTACKS, DOGE SUPPORT IS STILL STRONG
Democrats and the media, to maintain the status quo and a bloated, wasteful bureaucracy, have tried to portray DOGE as the biggest threat to this country since the British in 1812.
Musk can’t fight back alone. His DOGE army should be unleashed to make its case to the public. If that happens, based on what we saw with Baier, expect a big shift that puts the focus where it should be: on the mission.
