The tech billionaire Elon Musk has swiftly gained enormous power over the federal government as he works with the so-called Department of Government Efficiency to slash the federal bureaucracy — and upend the nation’s politics.

Elon Musk’s move-fast-and-break-things ethos has served him well so far in his efforts to demolish the federal bureaucracy. But now comes the moment the billionaire leading President Donald Trump’s DOGE initiative may not be prepared for — managing the politics of his sprawling cuts.

Elon Musk is keen on auditing the Federal Reserve, the independent agency that makes critical decisions on interest rates that reverberate throughout the US economy. Musk, the world’s richest man who is also overseeing a mass restructuring of the federal government,

Mr. Musk, one of President Trump’s main advisers, has not outlined a plan to reverse falling sales at the electric car company of which he is chief executive.

Last week, between posting photos of himself and slashing the federal bureaucracy, Elon Musk found the time to make some penis jokes. The world’s richest man briefly changed his display name on X to “Harry Bōlz,

Some civil servants are using whatever levers they have to resist the orders of the world’s richest man, both in public and behind closed doors.