Bernie Sanders has praised Elon Musk over plans by the tech billionaire’s new Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) to cut defense spending.
The veteran Democratic Senator, from Vermont, tweeted criticism for the department on Sunday, claiming that it had managed to “lose track of billions.”
“Elon Musk is right. The Pentagon, with a budget of $886 billion, just failed its 7th audit in a row. It’s lost track of billions,” he wrote. “Last year, only 13 senators voted against the Military Industrial Complex and a defense budget full of waste and fraud. That must change.”
Musk responded to Sanders’s post on Sunday with two American flag emojis.
The Vermont Senator isn’t the only Democratic lawmaker who has indicated they would be open to working with DOGE on reducing defense spending. Democratic Congressman Ro Khanna recently called out “waste, fraud and abuse” by the Department of Defense, also noting its failed audits.
“When it comes to cutting waste, fraud, and abuse and opening the 5 primes to more competition, there are Democrats on [the House Armed Services Committee] who will work with @elonmusk and @DOGE,” Khanna wrote in a post on X.
Congress has mandated that the Defense Department must pass an audit by fiscal year 2028.
Donald Trump previously named the SpaceX boss and former GOP presidential primary candidate Vivek Ramaswamy to head his government efficiency effort.
Sanders and Musk have in fact found common ground previously, with both men having shown support for making diabetes and weight loss drugs like Ozempic and Wegovy less expensive.
“Elon Musk, not one of my great political allies, recently posted on Twitter, and I quote ‘solving obesity reduces the risk of other diseases especially diabetes and improves quality of life, we do need to make appetite inhibitors available to anyone who wants them.’ Mr Musk is right.”
Responding to a video of Sanders’s remarks, Musk wrote on X, “I really am with Bernie on this one.”
However, Sanders has frequently criticized Musk for his vast accumulation of wealth, his millions in donations to Trump’s 2024 campaign and his acceptance of government contracts to fund his company SpaceX.
