Bulwark Takes - Elon's DOGE Email Unleashes Chaos

Episode Date: February 24, 2025

Tim Miller, Sam Stein and Lauren Egan discuss the most recent Elon mayhem: The email that went out on a Saturday asking federal employees what they did last week.

Hey guys, me Sam Stein, managing editor at The Bulwark. We are joined today for her inaugural Bulwark YouTube. Come on, a little more excited. No, I'm pumped, I'm pumped, I'm pumped. I feel like you had to give a little bit more excitement in that intro. We're joined today. Lauren Egan is joining us. She's coming on board. She's got a new newsletter, more on that later. Lauren, thanks so much. Happy to have you. Thank you for having me. And we're joined by Tim. What's up, y'all? Hey, Lauren. Let's do this.

What are we talking about? We're going to talk about Doge. We're going to talk about Elon. We're going to talk about Elon's email that went out over the weekend that everyone might be forced to resign if they didn't tell what five things they've done in the past week to their I guess to the Doge team. It's kind of blown up in Elon's face a little bit. The reason we're talking about it is that Trump was asked about it at a press conference today

with Emmanuel Macron. And here's what he said. Do you think that Doge could benefit from more streamlined communications? There was that email telling employees to give five things that they've done last week. Agency heads then told people to ignore it. You're talking about the last email that was sent where he wanted to know what you did this week. You know why he wanted that, by the way? I thought it was great because we have people that don't show up to work and nobody even knows if they work for the government. So by asking the question, tell us what you did this week, what he's doing is saying,

are you actually working? And then if you don't answer, like you're sort of semi-fired or you're fired, because a lot of people are not answering because they don't even exist. They're trying to find, that's how badly various parts of our government were run by, and especially by this last group.

So what they're doing is they're trying to find out who's working for the government are we paying other people that aren't working and you know where's all that where's the money going all right so there it is trump's like ah it seems like a good idea it's not so bad but in reality everyone basically in the government has told elon to pound sand right like all different, HHS, they initially said you should respond and they said don't. USDA said don't respond and also don't worry, there's no penalty for not responding. DOD said no. Tulsi Gabbard said no.

Kash Patel said no. All right. So, Tim, is this like an actual friction point between Elon and the rest of the cabinet? Or is there too much into it? I don't think so because Donald Trump also, in addition to that video you just showed, bleated this yesterday. All caps. Elon is doing a great job, but I'd like to see him get more aggressive.

Remember, we have a country to save. Blah, blah, blah. But that's the bleat that started the email. He bleeped that and then Elon emailed. Yeah, right. So Elon's pumping it up. He's excited about this, though. And all of these guys will do whatever Trump wants. Trump doesn't actually care about the response. I liked the meme going around with the guy that sent the office space response. It says, well, I generally came in 15 minutes late.

I used the side door. That way Lumberg can't see me. So, I mean, there weren't serious responses being sent here. I was wondering what the most outrageous response they get is going to be. I will tell you, though, we were at the Principles First Summit over the weekend. I'm sure people have seen. Maybe you can go to the other videos on the feed if you haven't seen.

I did an event with Jared Polis and Sarah Longwell and the January 6th cops were there. Anyway, afterwards I was talking with, like that email went out while I was on stage. And afterwards I was talking with a couple of the attendees who are federal government workers who like did it, who like literally sent their reply in because they were nervous.

Yeah, I was talking to people over the weekend who were like, I guess I'm just going to start writing about what I did last week. Like, I don't know what else to do. But I feel like it's almost like revenge of the middle managers right now. Like middle managers are just kind of like, we're not doing this. And it's kind of like the first crack. I feel like we're seeing that like anyone who like has worked in the federal government just knows how big of a bureaucracy it is and how these middle managers are going to try and protect their teams to the extent they can.

And I feel like their morale sucks. No, no, no, no. We're not doing this. Lauren's pitch is this being the revenge of the middle managers is the first thing that's made me side with Elon this whole time. I'm like, oh, okay. I'm like'm like i don't know nobody likes the middle manager no we have too many middle managers but in this case the middle manager is literally the cabinet official it's like cash patel being like or cash is in the cabinet but like it's you know cash is like you

know what actually i don't really think that elon should determine if my team resigns because they didn't respond to Elon's email. Yeah. I mean, it's like the first sign that he's not going to be universally successful in literally everything he's doing. Right. That's what's interesting to me is that he has no actual authority to do this, right? He can't, like, force people from the government. But more than that, he's inserting himself into other people's business.

And it's totally arbitrary. And obviously, it was totally ill conceived, right? Like what actually think about actually, if it actually works, right? Like you get 2.3 million emails, and then what do you do with it? Yeah, and is there like a scoring system for like, what are you looking for in the response? We're going to use AI. What is the right like buzzword? Grok is going to determine who gave the worst answers. And then we'll and then we're gonna use ai what is the right like buzzword yeah grok grok

is gonna determine who gave the worst answers and then we'll and then we're gonna fire five percent no i mean everything that he's done has been ill-conceived so like here is like on the one hand this is just total like he's way he's way out over his skis they don't know what they're doing it's a shit show they're gonna get overturned in court they've already been overturned in court that said like one part of their motivation here is i do think that they want to make people's lives miserable and they want people to self-resign like this is like they want people to choose to leave the federal government because they don't want to deal with this shit so they can either replace them with loyalists or not replace them like and that is like a part of their strategy and so my guess is that like while elon was sort of titillated by like fucking bossing people around and making them do busy work for him like and that was really

the whole thing like he likes sending out dick emails because he likes the attention i do think there are probably some people around him the rest votes of the world that are kind of like the more he annoys these people these people being the entire federal government workforce the better for our ends so it's like partially useful but that's the thing that got me i guess was that um it was just so unimaginative like he's done the same exact thing at prior workplaces right like it just feels so like corporate you know like yeah like he's taking his playbook and he's adopting it to feels so like corporate you know like yeah like he's taking his playbook and he's adopting it to the government i want him to like come up with

innovative ways to make people miserable there's got to be other ways to do it an agent of chaos sam yeah exactly i feel like if he's gonna do this on a broader scale try something new it feels kind of like a sam stein email to staff really actually i was gonna say yeah sam if i It feels kind of like a Sam Stein email to staff, really, actually. I was going to say, yeah, Sam, if I get that kind of email at a weekend, I'm out. I've never sent a top five email. The other thing, though, is I guess, and this goes back to Trump, is like, do we really think he actually doesn't find it a little annoying? Right? Like, you think he's totally cool with this, Tim? I sense that he, how can you not he how can you not how can you not

find some of this annoying elon's around all the time he's constantly doing stupid shit he's getting overturned in court constantly he's annoying all your people all the people you've put around you uh like i find that i find that that would be grating i find that i wouldn't have fun with that yeah i well i don't you know it's hard for me to predict i'm not asking you to predict i'm just saying would you want to hang out with someone like no of course not oh i'd rather rip my toenails off than spend five minutes with elon like i've no interest in hanging out with him but trump you would think he would have been sick with him already and like trump surrounds himself again like say what about trump's new york life

like he he was you know he wishes he got more respect there was a rodney dangerfield element of it but like he hung out with like celebrities and rappers and like cool people and smart people and he was a businessman at the apprentice and now he's like hanging out with cougars and mar-a-lago and like seb gorka and like you would have thought he'd be sick of it already so maybe he won't get sick of me on i don't know i do think that that he likes the fact that Elon is super rich and famous, and he feels like he gets benefit from that. I feel like as long as he feels like he's getting benefit from it, then Elon will still be around.

But Elon's definitely going to create tensions within the staff underneath. But no matter who's in there, these people are going to be like monkeys throwing shit at each other. Yeah, maybe that's it. It's just Elon's so wealthy that you can't afford to not have him around yeah i mean i think it is surprising that he's wanted him around this long like when this first when he first took office i feel like the conventional wisdom was trump's gonna get bored he always gets bored he's gonna get jealous of the spotlight and it hasn't happened yet so i don't know he's got got something for

elon i don't know he's not ending anytime. Lauren, I do wonder you covered before you were covering the Biden White House. And this is just so different. Like, you have to just be like, is this even the same world? I mean, the Biden White House was so quiet and stuffy. It's like, I wonder if Steve Reschetti is Matt. I mean, it's just, it's got to be kind of astounding. Obviously, we've all talked about when Biden was in office how it was so boring compared to Trump. And like, that is just true. Like, what was the most exciting thing that happened during the Biden years, Sam? I can't even remember.

What's the most exciting story we wrote together? When he dropped out of the race. Like, that was it. Oh, obviously that. Yeah. Maybe it was nearer to the White House, though. Like, dropped out of the race like that was it oh obviously that yeah maybe it was near the white house though like the management of the white house yeah yeah i mean ron claim and joe mansion once got into it yeah i'm like ron right there was there was some people that like to be like a little spicy on twitter but like i don't that's

not even like the right word to use compared to like what the trump team does that's like stale mayonnaise compared to what's going on right now come on totally totally but i'm just saying what qualified is spicy then is just like no it's unfathomable to me that you would have in the biden years like i guess the the the comparison would be if like i can't even do it like it would be who would be the Elon of the Biden years? Like, Alex Soros was given the chance to tell all the cabinet officials, like, actually, if your people don't respond to me, they're going to resign. Maybe this is part of the problem. I forget if it was Kinzinger. I was on the pod last week, and we were making a joke about how I was going to start doing conspiracy theories so I could become the joe rogan of the left and they're like well who would be your elon smoking weed with

you in the studio and i'm like i don't know reed hoffman who would be the democratic version of kash patel and dan bongino these people don't exist isn't one yeah they don't erin erin rupar i was doing this when when the hex has got pointed secretary of defense i kept coming There just isn't one. Yeah, they don't exist. Aaron Ruppar? What are we talking about here? I was doing this when the Hague South got appointed secretary of defense. I kept trying to come up with a tweet about who he would pick. And it was offensive to all the people. I put Joe Scarborough in there. I was like, that's kind of mean to Joe.

I was like, I can't do Joe. That is very mean to Joe. Yeah. This popped up this morning. It's from Housing and Urban Development. Apparently someone hacked into their systems, apparently, and posted video. Don't show it. AI-generated video.

I think it's AI-generated. Don't show it. I know where you're going. Mm-mm. This was in their cafeteria. It's Donald Trump kissing Elon's feet. Long live the real king. I don't know.

Just wanted to give a little shout-out. In the cafeteria. In the cafeteria is the real king. I don't know. Just wanted to give a little shout out. In the cafeteria. In the cafeteria is the worst part. It's so cruel. It's not great. I don't know. It's a no for me. I don't like it.

Why do you mean it's a no? I mean, I don't like the image. I don't like. You're the most voyeuristic on the staff. What the fuck? Yeah, but not in this situation. I'm not voyeuristic towards Elon and Trump. I don't want to say. The one picture of Elon shirtless is still seared into my brain.

I can't get it out. Sometimes it just like appears. Yeah, he looks awful. It's just like he has the worst body I've ever seen, the proportions. But I also just don't like, there is this like resistance thing that I don't like. The proportions? His proportions are terrible. The resistance thing I don't like proportions these proportions are terrible the resistance thing i don't like is this like oh we're gonna try to make trump jealous by talking

about how yeah that's the real president i hate this gimmick it's too transparent it's too transparent and number two be careful what you wish for yeah wait what do you mean be careful you wish for i don't want king elon i don be careful what you wish for? I don't want King Elon. You know what I mean? Who the hell knows? I think what they want is just Trump to get rid of the guy. But I mean, I get it. I think it's so obviously transparent and animated that no one's going to buy it.

Even Trump's like, I know what you're trying to do. Yeah, it's just like too hokey at this point. Yeah. Yeah. All right. Well, we'll leave it there, folks. So we're recording this on Monday in the afternoon, the deadline to respond to this email, which apparently no one's responding to or only like one – the Department of Transportation,

I think you're required to respond. In Ed Martin's office, you're required to respond. It's so random. But apparently you're not – you don't need to respond anymore if you're like 90% of the rest of the government. Also, OPM has said you will not lose your jobs if you fail to respond despite Elon's tweet. But listen, if you're out there and you get any guidance, if you see anything after the midnight deadline, hit us up. We have a tip line, thebullwork.com slash tips.

You know how to reach us. We'll check those out. Lauren, how did it feel? It was a pleasure. It was a pleasure. was a pleasure not so bad right we're delighted to have you all right thanks more to come all right take care guys