WEBVTT - Will Musk Trigger a Government Shutdown? 0:00:02.720 --> 0:00:09.280 Bloomberg Audio Studios, podcasts, radio News. Musk, for all the 0:00:09.400 --> 0:00:13.800 kind of excitement he's caused among Republicans, could actually be 0:00:13.880 --> 0:00:15.960 setting them up for a real problem that's going to 0:00:16.040 --> 0:00:26.119 hit when funding runs out on March fourteenth. 0:00:27.320 --> 0:00:30.440 I'm Stephanie Flanders, head of Government and Economics at Bloomberg, 0:00:30.520 --> 0:00:33.360 and this is Trumpnomics, the podcast that looks at the 0:00:33.400 --> 0:00:36.839 economic world of Donald Trump, how he's already shaped the 0:00:36.880 --> 0:00:39.760 global economy, and what on earth is going to happen 0:00:39.800 --> 0:00:44.280 next This week, our question is will Elon musk campaign 0:00:44.400 --> 0:00:47.839 to make the US government more efficient actually lead to 0:00:47.840 --> 0:00:51.479 its shutting down altogether in a few weeks time. On 0:00:51.560 --> 0:00:54.720 March fourteenth, the Continuing Resolution that funds the US federal 0:00:54.760 --> 0:00:57.800 government will run out and its work will shut down 0:00:58.240 --> 0:01:02.360 unless the Republican Congress and Donald Trump reach an agreement. Now, 0:01:02.560 --> 0:01:05.360 that was always going to be tough, but Elon Musk 0:01:05.480 --> 0:01:08.480 scorched earth overhaul of the US government via the so 0:01:08.600 --> 0:01:12.559 called Department of Government Efficiency DOGE appears to have made 0:01:12.560 --> 0:01:15.320 it a whole lot harder. So that's left me wanting 0:01:15.360 --> 0:01:18.440 to know what exactly are the chances the federal government 0:01:18.480 --> 0:01:20.960 shuts down in a few weeks. And if it does, 0:01:21.360 --> 0:01:24.160 will DOGE shut down as well? Or will that be 0:01:24.160 --> 0:01:26.800 an opportunity for Elon Musk and his team to really 0:01:26.840 --> 0:01:30.040 go to town. Now, of course, nobody knows the answer 0:01:30.080 --> 0:01:32.360 to those questions, but I have two people here who 0:01:32.440 --> 0:01:36.119 can speculate much more wisely than most. Josh Green, National 0:01:36.200 --> 0:01:38.880 correspondent at Bloomberg BusinessWeek, author of the New York Times 0:01:38.920 --> 0:01:43.360 bestseller Devil's Bargain, Steve Bannon, Donald Trump, and the National Uprising. Josh, 0:01:43.440 --> 0:01:44.240 great to have you back. 0:01:44.480 --> 0:01:46.760 Could to be with you and Laura. 0:01:46.560 --> 0:01:51.080 Davison, our White House editor specializing in DOGE taxes and 0:01:51.160 --> 0:01:53.640 fiscal policy. I think of you as the DOGE czar, 0:01:53.800 --> 0:01:56.280 but it just doesn't sound like a very nice name, Laura, 0:01:56.280 --> 0:01:58.120 so I won't call you that, but very good to 0:01:58.120 --> 0:01:58.400 have you. 0:01:58.880 --> 0:01:59.880 Thanks for having me. 0:02:06.160 --> 0:02:06.240 So. 0:02:06.320 --> 0:02:09.080 I think in a more normal year, we'd have talked 0:02:09.080 --> 0:02:12.280 about the prospect of a government shut down long before now, 0:02:12.320 --> 0:02:15.840 since we're so close to that formal deadline. But frankly, 0:02:15.919 --> 0:02:17.480 there's just been too much going on. 0:02:17.639 --> 0:02:17.959 Josh. 0:02:18.000 --> 0:02:20.280 I mean, you did draw attention to this a few 0:02:20.360 --> 0:02:23.360 days ago in your excellent Business Week newsletter, but you 0:02:23.520 --> 0:02:28.639 describe their Elon Musk rampaging across Washington like Godzilla leveling Tokyo, 0:02:28.960 --> 0:02:32.480 packing away at federal agencies and firing workers on mass 0:02:32.520 --> 0:02:35.560 through Doge, I think, very good visual image. You had 0:02:35.600 --> 0:02:38.880 fun there. Doge appears to be having quite a lot 0:02:38.880 --> 0:02:44.040 of blowback out in people's constituencies. Is certainly causing a 0:02:44.040 --> 0:02:46.760 lot of headlines, a lot of stories. But there's a 0:02:46.840 --> 0:02:50.079 very specific problem for the Republican leadership in Congress when 0:02:50.080 --> 0:02:52.720 it comes to these upcoming votes to keep the government running. 0:02:52.760 --> 0:02:54.720 So can you just take us through what they needed 0:02:54.720 --> 0:02:57.120 to happen and how Musk has made it harder. 0:02:57.760 --> 0:03:00.640 The vibe in Washington right now among republic pilkins is 0:03:00.840 --> 0:03:04.000 very positive and very excited, and a lot of Trump 0:03:04.040 --> 0:03:08.919 fans have really enjoyed watching Musk shutter agencies, fireworkers, create 0:03:08.960 --> 0:03:11.920 all this chaos that has Democrats so upset, and of 0:03:11.960 --> 0:03:14.360 course that's where all the news focus has been. But 0:03:14.360 --> 0:03:16.680 if you look right now, the conference is divided between 0:03:16.680 --> 0:03:21.320 a small group of hardline deficit hawks and the broader group, 0:03:21.360 --> 0:03:25.359 which includes moderate Republicans from districts that Joe Biden won 0:03:25.760 --> 0:03:28.760 who are concerned about deep spending cuts and so Republicans 0:03:28.760 --> 0:03:32.360 haven't been able to agree on a spending bill. This 0:03:32.480 --> 0:03:35.920 is not something that's new. In the past, Republicans have 0:03:36.000 --> 0:03:39.119 run into the same problem In twenty twenty three, Kevin McCarthy, 0:03:39.160 --> 0:03:42.800 the House Speaker, had to rely on Democratic votes. Last December, 0:03:42.840 --> 0:03:46.200 Mike Johnson, his successor, again had to rely on Democratic 0:03:46.320 --> 0:03:50.520 votes to averta shutdown. So before Elon Musk, there had 0:03:50.560 --> 0:03:52.640 always been this kind of off ramp when I think 0:03:52.640 --> 0:03:55.080 of as an off ramp, where a Republican House Speaker 0:03:55.080 --> 0:03:57.640 who was in trouble could at the last minute cobble 0:03:57.680 --> 0:04:00.320 together some kind of a deal with Democrats to keep 0:04:00.320 --> 0:04:04.040 the government funded. This time, however, the Democrats I've spoken 0:04:04.080 --> 0:04:07.480 to have been very angry about what Elon Musk is 0:04:07.520 --> 0:04:09.840 doing and what Donald Trump is doing. And a couple 0:04:09.840 --> 0:04:11.320 of them it said to me in the last couple 0:04:11.400 --> 0:04:14.080 of weeks, why would we help out Speaker Johnson and 0:04:14.120 --> 0:04:16.200 Republicans and agree to any kind of a deal. How 0:04:16.200 --> 0:04:18.880 could we possibly trust it if Elon Musk and Trump 0:04:18.880 --> 0:04:22.400 could just go ahead and summarily tear apart anything that 0:04:22.400 --> 0:04:25.520 we'd agreed to. And to me, that raises an interesting 0:04:25.600 --> 0:04:27.760 tension that a lot of people aren't focused on yet. 0:04:27.760 --> 0:04:31.440 That Musk, for all the kind of excitement he's caused 0:04:31.440 --> 0:04:34.880 among Republicans, could actually be setting them up for a 0:04:34.920 --> 0:04:37.120 real problem that's going to hit when funding runs out 0:04:37.160 --> 0:04:38.440 on March fourteenth. 0:04:38.520 --> 0:04:41.039 You mentioned that they've needed Democratic votes in the past. 0:04:41.120 --> 0:04:43.120 Just to be specific about it, there are quite a 0:04:43.120 --> 0:04:46.480 few Republican congressmen who and people who have never voted 0:04:46.520 --> 0:04:49.640 for one of these continuing resolutions, even with larger majorities 0:04:49.680 --> 0:04:53.280 than they have now, they've always had to go to Democrats. 0:04:53.520 --> 0:04:58.279 Given that direct linkage that you're making with Elon Musk's 0:04:58.640 --> 0:05:04.000 unpopularity with Democrats and the need to get some Democrat votes, 0:05:04.080 --> 0:05:05.800 do you get the sense that they're going to link 0:05:05.839 --> 0:05:07.320 the two in any way, that they're trying to put 0:05:07.400 --> 0:05:10.719 some restraint on Doze or on President Trump more generally 0:05:10.800 --> 0:05:12.880 in return for that support, or would that be too 0:05:12.960 --> 0:05:13.839 explicit for them. 0:05:14.040 --> 0:05:16.720 No, that's exactly the question that I've been asking, and 0:05:16.920 --> 0:05:20.360 the feedback I've gotten has been twofold. On the one hand, 0:05:20.600 --> 0:05:23.719 there's the obvious worry, which you've mentioned, that how can 0:05:23.760 --> 0:05:27.799 we have assurance that any deal we strike won't immediately 0:05:27.839 --> 0:05:31.040 be torn apart or ignored by Musk? The question I've 0:05:31.040 --> 0:05:34.240 been asking is would you actually write legislative language into 0:05:34.240 --> 0:05:37.640 an agreement saying Elon Musk cannot cut this agency? Or 0:05:37.680 --> 0:05:40.840 perhaps Trump could do what's called a presidential signing statement. 0:05:40.920 --> 0:05:43.160 George W. Bush used to do these a lot, that 0:05:43.200 --> 0:05:47.440 would specify his intentions for what a bill means and 0:05:47.480 --> 0:05:50.440 how it should be interpreted. To guard it against Elon Musk, 0:05:50.480 --> 0:05:52.120 There's got to be some kind of an assurance from 0:05:52.120 --> 0:05:55.360 Democrats that the deal they agree to is going to 0:05:55.880 --> 0:06:00.000 withstand Doge's attacks. But then the other factor in all 0:06:00.200 --> 0:06:03.799 of this is that the Democratic Party is very unpopular. 0:06:03.800 --> 0:06:06.800 It's favorability rating is something like in the mid thirties, 0:06:07.160 --> 0:06:09.960 and so there's a lot of pressure on Democratic lawmakers 0:06:10.000 --> 0:06:13.920 from Democratic voters not to simply roll over and enable 0:06:14.000 --> 0:06:17.479 Trump and Republicans to continue what they view as an 0:06:17.520 --> 0:06:20.000 assault on government. So there are a lot of forces, 0:06:20.080 --> 0:06:23.560 I think, behind the scenes that are pushing the two 0:06:23.640 --> 0:06:25.799 sides toward what looks to me to be a pretty 0:06:25.839 --> 0:06:27.160 high chance of a government shutdown. 0:06:27.880 --> 0:06:29.680 I guess, just to be clear, everyone in Congress is 0:06:29.720 --> 0:06:33.280 pretty unpopular, right. The Republicans in Congress are not super popular, 0:06:33.400 --> 0:06:35.799 or you would say, you think specifically as the Democrats. 0:06:36.040 --> 0:06:38.359 I think the Democrats right now are more unpopular. I 0:06:38.360 --> 0:06:41.279 saw Paul the other day that had Democrats running about 0:06:41.279 --> 0:06:44.839 twenty points behind, I think, in popularity behind Republicans. When 0:06:44.880 --> 0:06:47.039 Donald Trump even got a bit of a honeymoon, he 0:06:47.120 --> 0:06:50.120 had higher favorability ratings and unfavorability he rings for the 0:06:50.120 --> 0:06:52.880 first month or so of his presidency. But it's the 0:06:53.000 --> 0:06:56.560 view of Democrats among their own voters that is so 0:06:56.720 --> 0:07:00.920 worrisome to Democratic elected officials because they need this support 0:07:01.000 --> 0:07:03.520 in order to stay in their jobs, and they're very 0:07:03.839 --> 0:07:08.320 alert and attuned to the dissatisfaction in the Democratic base. 0:07:08.360 --> 0:07:10.200 And that too is a factor that's going to play 0:07:10.240 --> 0:07:12.680 into what Democrats are and aren't willing to agree on 0:07:12.720 --> 0:07:15.400 when it comes to cutting it spending deal with the Republicans. 0:07:15.600 --> 0:07:17.480 Okay, Joss, I might make you do a lot of work. 0:07:17.480 --> 0:07:19.640 I have one more question. Go on to something else, 0:07:19.680 --> 0:07:22.640 but I am interested. Do you think that doge has 0:07:22.760 --> 0:07:26.480 changed the politics of a shutdown because we don't normally 0:07:26.480 --> 0:07:29.200 talk about federal workers very much except if there's a shutdown, 0:07:29.440 --> 0:07:31.000 But I feel like we spent the last two or 0:07:31.040 --> 0:07:33.800 three weeks reading loads of stories about federal workers debating 0:07:33.800 --> 0:07:35.640 whether they're all useless, or whether any of them are 0:07:35.640 --> 0:07:38.360 really important. Do you think that maybe President Trump will 0:07:38.360 --> 0:07:41.120 be less frightened of a shutdown in this context? Will 0:07:41.160 --> 0:07:43.920 it just sort of muddy the waters around Doge. 0:07:44.160 --> 0:07:47.640 They're eager to test the proposition that the government really 0:07:47.640 --> 0:07:49.480 doesn't need all these employees to function on it, so 0:07:49.480 --> 0:07:51.800 I think there would be some appetite for a shutdown. 0:07:52.280 --> 0:07:54.720 The danger with that is that in the past, Republicans 0:07:54.760 --> 0:07:56.960 have gone into shutdowns saying, Oh, this isn't going to 0:07:57.040 --> 0:07:59.600 be a big deal, it will be fine, the government 0:07:59.600 --> 0:08:02.000 can cont you to run. In my view, we had 0:08:02.040 --> 0:08:04.440 a test to that back during the first Trump administration 0:08:04.520 --> 0:08:07.440 in twenty eighteen and twenty nineteen, when Republicans allowed a 0:08:07.480 --> 0:08:11.280 shutdown to occur because Trump wanted to secure immediate funding 0:08:11.360 --> 0:08:15.640 for a border wall, and the shutdown lasted thirty five days. Eventually, 0:08:15.680 --> 0:08:19.880 there was a lot of blowback from ordinary Americans, and 0:08:20.480 --> 0:08:24.520 Trump ended up agreeing to reopen the government without having 0:08:24.560 --> 0:08:27.680 secured that funding. Republicans and Trump lost that shutdown because 0:08:27.680 --> 0:08:30.840 the political pressure became too much for them to bear. 0:08:31.280 --> 0:08:34.120 I think the longer a shutdown goes on, regardless of 0:08:34.160 --> 0:08:36.640 how excited Republicans might be in the front end of that. 0:08:37.400 --> 0:08:40.079 The political pressure on them to get the government running 0:08:40.080 --> 0:08:43.480 again is only going to increase. Elon Musk may not care, 0:08:44.080 --> 0:08:47.079 a lot of Republicans eager to fire government workers may 0:08:47.080 --> 0:08:49.200 not care. But at the end of the day, Republican 0:08:49.200 --> 0:08:51.600 elected officials want to keep their jobs and Trump wants 0:08:51.640 --> 0:08:54.400 to maintain his popularity, and it's very hard for me 0:08:54.440 --> 0:08:56.680 to see how they would be able to do that 0:08:56.760 --> 0:08:58.280 over an extended government shutdown. 0:08:58.559 --> 0:08:59.960 I can be come back to a bit later, because 0:09:00.240 --> 0:09:02.680 I do want to think about the implications for doge 0:09:02.720 --> 0:09:05.640 itself and their activities if the government shuts down. But first, 0:09:05.720 --> 0:09:08.120 I mean, we've had a lot of politics, which is 0:09:08.200 --> 0:09:10.959 only occasionally allowed on Trumponomics, But I wanted to also 0:09:11.120 --> 0:09:14.640 think about some of the numbers involved here, and specifically 0:09:14.880 --> 0:09:17.880 have a quick think about whether all these firings and 0:09:17.920 --> 0:09:21.960 scary emails and all the fire smoke coming out of 0:09:22.400 --> 0:09:25.920 federal government thanks to DOGE, has actually produced a lot 0:09:25.920 --> 0:09:28.280 of savings for the US taxpayer. So Laura, you and 0:09:28.320 --> 0:09:30.120 your team keep a close eye on all this. And 0:09:30.360 --> 0:09:33.960 I see that DOGE itself has claimed recently that it's 0:09:34.000 --> 0:09:37.400 already found fifty five billion dollars worth of savings. Now, 0:09:37.440 --> 0:09:39.480 our chief economy is pointed out, and a woe pointed 0:09:39.480 --> 0:09:42.400 out on this show not long ago that you'd need 0:09:42.440 --> 0:09:45.079 around eight times that you'd need more like four hundred 0:09:45.120 --> 0:09:50.000 billion to really make a dent on the US borrowing trajectory. 0:09:50.400 --> 0:09:52.839 But still in just a few weeks, fifty five billion 0:09:52.880 --> 0:09:55.959 would be pretty impressive. Is it true so far? 0:09:56.160 --> 0:09:58.760 No, And they actually recently updated that number just sixty 0:09:58.800 --> 0:10:01.480 five billion, But we still have seen their accounting of 0:10:01.480 --> 0:10:02.240 how they got there. 0:10:02.360 --> 0:10:03.760 So in the last few days it's gone up from 0:10:03.760 --> 0:10:04.960 fifty five to sixty five. 0:10:05.520 --> 0:10:09.720 Yes, but the underlying sort of accounting doesn't bear that out. 0:10:10.080 --> 0:10:12.840 Doge has really made this claim that they are the 0:10:12.880 --> 0:10:16.160 most transparent agency out there, that they are doing this 0:10:16.200 --> 0:10:19.440 all in public view. For the first couple weeks, what 0:10:19.440 --> 0:10:21.800 this really was was just an x account just posting, hey, 0:10:21.880 --> 0:10:24.680 we canceled this contract. We canceled that contract. In the 0:10:24.720 --> 0:10:26.600 past week or so, they have put this all on 0:10:26.640 --> 0:10:29.080 a Doze website and basically listed here are all the 0:10:29.120 --> 0:10:32.280 contracts that we have canceled. If you go through there's 0:10:32.320 --> 0:10:34.520 an At this point, I had a couple thousand there 0:10:34.559 --> 0:10:36.880 when we did the math last week on this There 0:10:36.880 --> 0:10:41.640 were about sixteen billion dollars worth of contracts listed there. However, 0:10:41.960 --> 0:10:44.040 there was one that doesn't add up to the fifty 0:10:44.080 --> 0:10:45.840 five billion that they were claiming at the top line. 0:10:45.880 --> 0:10:48.320 And then once you dug down into these contracts, we 0:10:48.400 --> 0:10:51.120 found one pretty major error that showed an eight billion 0:10:51.160 --> 0:10:54.960 dollar contract that was actually an eight million dollar contract. 0:10:55.160 --> 0:10:56.640 That's the kind of a state you make when you're 0:10:56.640 --> 0:10:58.439 the richest man in the world and you're just constantly 0:10:58.480 --> 0:11:00.000 getting your millions and billions mixed up. 0:11:00.400 --> 0:11:03.080 But truly, as you mentioned, that doesn't really move the dial, 0:11:03.200 --> 0:11:04.959 but it showed and caused a lot of called into 0:11:05.040 --> 0:11:09.079 a question Doge and how transparent they are being. Actually, 0:11:09.400 --> 0:11:12.280 they've accounted for about eight billion dollars worth of savings. 0:11:12.640 --> 0:11:15.480 That's not that much here at Bloomberg when we're talking 0:11:15.520 --> 0:11:17.760 about tax policies, we sometimes don't even really start talking 0:11:17.760 --> 0:11:19.800 about them ntill they're about one hundred billion dollars. 0:11:20.160 --> 0:11:22.360 Get out of bed for less than a few billions. 0:11:22.840 --> 0:11:26.080 Other other colleagues have noted for various tax savings that 0:11:26.160 --> 0:11:28.360 in this bill that Republicans are looking to pass later 0:11:28.400 --> 0:11:31.560 this year. Elon Musk personally could benefit by hundreds of 0:11:31.559 --> 0:11:33.360 billions of dollars. So the fact that his group is 0:11:33.400 --> 0:11:36.160 only saving eight billion dollars really just goes to show 0:11:36.200 --> 0:11:37.720 just how they're barely denting the surface. 0:11:38.000 --> 0:11:40.280 And it's weird. I mean that particular example, the million 0:11:40.280 --> 0:11:42.079 billion one. I mean, we joke around it, but actually 0:11:42.120 --> 0:11:43.679 it's also one of those ones where it's just on 0:11:43.720 --> 0:11:47.840 its face it's mad. You sort of wonder, how if 0:11:47.880 --> 0:11:49.959 you just tell us a bit more about the detail 0:11:50.000 --> 0:11:52.440 of what the claim is in terms of how this 0:11:52.880 --> 0:11:57.400 contract would be bigger than anything that this company has 0:11:57.440 --> 0:11:59.000 had anything to do with ever. 0:11:59.679 --> 0:12:01.720 Yes, so this was a contractor that's out in a 0:12:01.800 --> 0:12:05.000 Washington suburb. Their average contract going back was about a 0:12:05.120 --> 0:12:08.440 million dollars, so this having an eight billion dollar contract 0:12:08.600 --> 0:12:10.200 would just be wildly out of proportion. 0:12:10.320 --> 0:12:12.320 And it is a DEI contract, right of course you 0:12:12.320 --> 0:12:14.440 want to claim that you were wasting lots and lots 0:12:14.440 --> 0:12:15.360 of money on DEI. 0:12:15.880 --> 0:12:18.079 Yes, And even for the agency this contract was going through, 0:12:18.080 --> 0:12:20.320 their entire budget was only about nine billion dollars. So 0:12:20.360 --> 0:12:22.400 the fact that they would have one single contract being 0:12:22.400 --> 0:12:24.720 eight billion on DEI just doesn't stand up. 0:12:24.840 --> 0:12:25.720 And it was eight million. 0:12:25.960 --> 0:12:28.440 It was for eight million. The other thing that was 0:12:28.480 --> 0:12:30.880 really called into question even of Okay, say you make 0:12:30.920 --> 0:12:34.280 that accounting change, you have eight billion dollars in which 0:12:34.400 --> 0:12:37.120 in what they say they've saved, all of these contracts 0:12:37.160 --> 0:12:40.079 that are listed basically have a maximum value, and that 0:12:40.200 --> 0:12:42.679 doesn't mean that top line number is actually what's spent, 0:12:43.040 --> 0:12:45.360 So that eight billion dollars is probably actually much less 0:12:45.360 --> 0:12:47.719 after you go through a discount all of these contracts 0:12:47.960 --> 0:12:50.319 across the board. Doe just quick to point out that, look, 0:12:50.360 --> 0:12:52.480 this doesn't account for all of the the leases that 0:12:52.520 --> 0:12:55.040 we've canceled, all the personnel that we have pulled from 0:12:55.040 --> 0:12:57.480 the federal government roles. But even still, even if you 0:12:57.520 --> 0:12:59.880 give a very generous estimate to all of those, were 0:13:00.040 --> 0:13:02.400 still just talking a couple more billion dollars here and there. 0:13:02.559 --> 0:13:05.200 This claim that Musk started with a two trillion dollar 0:13:05.440 --> 0:13:08.120 goal of cutting two trillion dollars from the federal deficit. 0:13:08.320 --> 0:13:10.679 He's now decreased that to one trillion. So the goalposts 0:13:10.679 --> 0:13:12.320 really keep moving here, just week by week. 0:13:13.200 --> 0:13:16.400 I guess you could say he's providing the open goal 0:13:16.640 --> 0:13:19.440 by making all this transparent on the website, Given that 0:13:19.480 --> 0:13:20.960 a lot of people seem to be quite happy to 0:13:20.960 --> 0:13:23.440 take at face value that claims he's been making on x. 0:13:24.040 --> 0:13:26.640 I guess they deserve some credit for the transparency of 0:13:26.679 --> 0:13:28.839 the website, especially if it means we find all these 0:13:28.920 --> 0:13:30.800 errors and we can constantly criticize them. 0:13:31.240 --> 0:13:34.040 The other criticism, though, is that there's really not a 0:13:34.040 --> 0:13:36.560 lot of transparency requirements for DOGE. It is not a 0:13:36.640 --> 0:13:39.719 department as all the other Department of Homeland Security. It's 0:13:39.760 --> 0:13:43.120 really just an office within the White House. Musk himself 0:13:43.120 --> 0:13:46.600 doesn't have to disclose his finances publicly. They also don't 0:13:46.640 --> 0:13:48.839 have the same sort of scrutiny from a watchdog or 0:13:48.840 --> 0:13:51.040 an inspector general that would have the same sort of oversight. 0:13:51.080 --> 0:13:52.880 They don't have to report who the people are. There's 0:13:52.920 --> 0:13:55.440 questions of are these doze kids, as they've been called, 0:13:55.480 --> 0:13:57.520 going to these different agencies, a lot of them very young. 0:13:57.679 --> 0:14:00.800 Have they completed their ethics training, the t training. There's 0:14:00.840 --> 0:14:03.480 been some cases we've reported on lapses there that have 0:14:03.559 --> 0:14:06.560 cropped up. So they really aren't subject to the same 0:14:06.640 --> 0:14:08.920 hiring practices and scrutiny as any other of the federal 0:14:08.960 --> 0:14:10.439 workers that they're going in and auditing. 0:14:10.880 --> 0:14:12.760 And to your point about the website, they don't seem 0:14:12.800 --> 0:14:15.319 to have done a lot of basic arithmesy. This actually 0:14:15.400 --> 0:14:18.320 takes us that the status of DOGE and the fact 0:14:18.360 --> 0:14:20.000 that it's not subject to a lot of these things, 0:14:20.040 --> 0:14:24.800 actually raises this much intriguing question of what happens to 0:14:25.040 --> 0:14:28.560 DOGE efforts themselves in the case of a government shutdown, 0:14:28.880 --> 0:14:30.720 And mean, I go back to you, Josh, what's your 0:14:31.040 --> 0:14:35.400 sense would we consider the DOGE effort to now be 0:14:35.600 --> 0:14:37.480 enough part of the federal government that all of its 0:14:37.480 --> 0:14:39.520 people have to go home? Or would it the counter's 0:14:39.720 --> 0:14:43.400 essential workers it's essential to be cutting the government even 0:14:43.440 --> 0:14:44.440 as you shut it down. 0:14:44.800 --> 0:14:47.560 Yeah, it's a great question. That's one that Democrats and 0:14:47.680 --> 0:14:50.880 Republicans have started to ask themselves. I spent yesterday talking 0:14:50.920 --> 0:14:53.440 to a couple of House and Senate staffers just asking 0:14:53.440 --> 0:14:56.120 the basic question, would DOGE be allowed to continue operating 0:14:56.160 --> 0:14:59.000 in a government shutdown? There isn't a clear answer, but 0:14:59.040 --> 0:15:01.880 the general sense that I got was that staffers both 0:15:01.920 --> 0:15:04.240 in the House and Senate think that it probably would 0:15:04.280 --> 0:15:06.720 be because the president does have a lot of leeway 0:15:07.080 --> 0:15:10.760 to declare certain workers essential to the government. And so, 0:15:10.800 --> 0:15:12.920 as one Democratic House staffer put it to me, I 0:15:12.920 --> 0:15:16.080 don't think DOGE would even pause, I did get an 0:15:16.120 --> 0:15:19.720 interesting illustration of the way that presidents used this power 0:15:19.720 --> 0:15:22.000 to manipulate public opinion. And I think it might come 0:15:22.040 --> 0:15:23.880 into play with Trump and Doze if there is a 0:15:23.920 --> 0:15:27.960 government shutdown. Back in twenty thirteen, when Barack Obama was president, 0:15:28.280 --> 0:15:31.680 there was a shutdown and Obama shut the National Parks down, 0:15:31.760 --> 0:15:34.280 and Republicans got very angry about that because they said, 0:15:34.360 --> 0:15:36.760 Obama has the power to keep this open. He's doing 0:15:36.760 --> 0:15:40.520 this for political purposes to get people mad at Republicans. 0:15:40.240 --> 0:15:43.880 And he was compliance right, yeah, yeah, exactly. 0:15:43.960 --> 0:15:46.760 But then during the twenty eighteen government shutdown when Trump 0:15:46.920 --> 0:15:49.880 was president, Trump made a point of keeping a bunch 0:15:49.960 --> 0:15:53.160 of stuff open, including the National Parks, in order to 0:15:53.280 --> 0:15:56.320 underscore the argument that shutdowns aren't that bad and it 0:15:56.360 --> 0:15:59.480 wasn't his fault when things got messed up during a shutdown. 0:15:59.800 --> 0:16:02.000 Think if you flip that around and put it in 0:16:02.000 --> 0:16:05.760 a Doze context, Trump, I don't see why Trump couldn't 0:16:05.880 --> 0:16:09.800 argue that Doze are essential workers. They're actually helping to 0:16:09.960 --> 0:16:12.920 balance the budget by continuing to kind of fire people 0:16:12.960 --> 0:16:14.680 and do these things at Trump and Musk think is 0:16:14.720 --> 0:16:17.440 so important. And I don't know what power Democrats would 0:16:17.480 --> 0:16:19.160 have to stop them. So while we don't have a 0:16:19.200 --> 0:16:22.360 clear and definitive answer yet, the assumption among people I 0:16:22.440 --> 0:16:24.280 talked to on the Hill is that DOGE probably would 0:16:24.280 --> 0:16:26.080 be able to continue operating in a shutdown. 0:16:26.640 --> 0:16:29.840 There's a lot of thought also with the DOGE that 0:16:29.880 --> 0:16:32.560 a shutdown would actually be very beneficial because they wouldn't 0:16:32.600 --> 0:16:34.840 be encumbered by all of the career staff that would 0:16:34.840 --> 0:16:36.600 be in the office. They've run into lots of issues 0:16:36.600 --> 0:16:38.840 where they want to access a data set, they want 0:16:39.000 --> 0:16:42.520 access to certain files, and the staff that's there says no. Suddenly, 0:16:42.560 --> 0:16:44.360 if you remove all those people from the building for 0:16:44.360 --> 0:16:46.520 an extended period of time, DOGE has a lot more 0:16:46.600 --> 0:16:48.880 leeway to just run roughshot and grab what they want. 0:16:49.240 --> 0:16:52.040 So you've raised the other sort of big question out 0:16:52.040 --> 0:16:54.920 of all this. I started off asking where Republicans now 0:16:54.960 --> 0:16:58.480 be less scared of a shutdown? Well, Democrats actually wonder 0:16:58.560 --> 0:17:01.920 about really concerned about the federal government. Should they be 0:17:02.000 --> 0:17:03.280 pretty concerned about shutdown? 0:17:03.320 --> 0:17:05.840 If you guys are right, it's a good question. I 0:17:05.840 --> 0:17:09.280 think everybody's trying to figure this out. The impression I 0:17:09.320 --> 0:17:12.000 have in talking to Democrats is that they're just very 0:17:12.040 --> 0:17:14.600 frustrated with the way all this is going, and so 0:17:14.840 --> 0:17:17.280 I don't imagine that a lot of them are going 0:17:17.359 --> 0:17:20.560 to be eager to just keep things rolling along. There's 0:17:20.600 --> 0:17:23.359 certainly an appetite among at least some Democratic staffers that 0:17:23.440 --> 0:17:25.639 I've talked to, that Trump just needs to get a 0:17:25.640 --> 0:17:27.840 taste of his own medicine, and he wants to shut 0:17:27.840 --> 0:17:30.119 the government down. Let's go ahead and do it, and 0:17:30.200 --> 0:17:32.919 let him deal with all the political blowback that happens 0:17:32.960 --> 0:17:35.200 as a result of that. But one other thing I 0:17:35.240 --> 0:17:37.720 think is worth mentioning is, and this is a concern 0:17:37.760 --> 0:17:40.840 among Democrats I spoke to, is that there is a 0:17:40.880 --> 0:17:44.240 lot of fear of what could doje in musk do 0:17:44.520 --> 0:17:47.280 during a shutdown if they were allowed to continue operating. 0:17:47.320 --> 0:17:51.640 And one particular area of concern is the treasury payment system. 0:17:51.960 --> 0:17:55.159 There's been talk in the past among Republicans that a 0:17:55.200 --> 0:17:57.280 shutdown wouldn't be so bad because they could sort of 0:17:57.359 --> 0:17:59.800 decide which bills to pay and which bills not to 0:17:59.800 --> 0:18:02.600 pay and keep things rolling for a long time. So 0:18:02.640 --> 0:18:05.720 you't government wouldn't default on treasury bonds, but it might 0:18:05.760 --> 0:18:08.320 shut down other payments. That is something that a lot 0:18:08.359 --> 0:18:10.639 of people view is very dangerous. To the market, to 0:18:10.680 --> 0:18:13.679 global markets if there were a shutdown. We now know 0:18:13.760 --> 0:18:16.040 that the dose folks do have access to a lot 0:18:16.040 --> 0:18:19.120 of these payment systems. Nobody really knows what could happen, 0:18:19.200 --> 0:18:21.280 what kind of mishift they could get up to, if 0:18:21.280 --> 0:18:23.400 this kind of scenario were to unfold. 0:18:23.800 --> 0:18:25.480 I guess we should say at this point it's got best. 0:18:26.000 --> 0:18:27.879 We've interviewed a couple of times in Bloomberg in the 0:18:27.920 --> 0:18:31.000 last couple of weeks. He comes from Wall Street. He's 0:18:31.040 --> 0:18:33.560 been very clear that this is we're all getting ahead 0:18:33.560 --> 0:18:37.000 of ourselves in worrying about specifically those functions and the 0:18:37.200 --> 0:18:39.600 running of the treasury market. He thinks all of that 0:18:39.720 --> 0:18:43.120 is hysterical. I think what you stated in terms of 0:18:43.160 --> 0:18:47.000 the possible leavers they would have and the lack of 0:18:47.040 --> 0:18:49.120 clarity we would have in the vent of a shutdown, 0:18:49.160 --> 0:18:51.199 I think is all true. But we should say there 0:18:51.280 --> 0:18:55.119 is supposedly someone who cares about these things sitting inside 0:18:55.280 --> 0:18:59.080 fifteen hundred Pennsylvania Avenue that the Treasury Department. I guess 0:18:59.119 --> 0:19:04.720 one last question is just goes back to this broader environment, 0:19:04.760 --> 0:19:08.480 the rather febrile environment we have. If we have a shutdown, 0:19:09.119 --> 0:19:12.120 rightly or wrongly, is it seem to be the sort 0:19:12.119 --> 0:19:16.640 of defining battle between Congress and the executive This sort 0:19:16.640 --> 0:19:19.440 of ongoing tussle we've had with President Trump over who 0:19:19.480 --> 0:19:22.679 actually controls the power of the purse, who can control 0:19:22.720 --> 0:19:25.119 whether to actually spend money or not. You were hinting 0:19:25.119 --> 0:19:27.159