Elon Musk and DOGE upend government with firings, budget cuts

In these fast and furious first four weeks of his second term, President Trump has had something unusual for him, a co-star. With the president's blessing, Elon Musk has taken a wrecking ball to the federal bureaucracy, just as he promised he would. But as the wealthiest man in human history and his doge team make their aggressive layoffs and budget cuts, the courts are pushing back. NBC News White House correspondent Yemi Shalsindo has our Sunday focus. We've had a great discussion, terrific. An extraordinary scene playing out in the Oval Office this week. The world's richest man standing alongside the world's most powerful one promising to reshape the American government as we know it. A lot of times that, you know, people that don't get what they voted for, but in this presidency, they are going to get what they voted for. And that's what democracy is all about. And what the people want, Musk says, is to drastically slim down the federal government.

在他第二任期前四周的快速而激烈的期间，特朗普总统有了一位不同寻常的“搭档”。在总统的支持下，埃隆·马斯克如他承诺的那样，对联邦官僚体系进行大刀阔斧的改革。不过，作为人类历史上最富有的人，马斯克和他的小分队在进行积极裁员和预算削减时，却遭遇了法院的反击。NBC新闻白宫记者叶米·沙尔辛多对此进行了关注。本周在椭圆形办公室上演了一场不同寻常的场景：全球最富有的人与全球最有权势的人站在一起，承诺将重塑我们所知的美国政府。很多时候，人们投票后并没有得到他们想要的结果，而在这届政府中，他们将得到自己投票选择的结果，这就是民主的意义所在。马斯克表示，人民希望大幅缩减联邦政府规模。

We're going to find billions, hundreds of billions of dollars of fraud and abuse. Since President Trump took office, Musk and his Department of Government Efficiency, or doge, have moved at lightning speed, firing thousands of employees with Musk warning more could follow. We do need to delete entire agencies. And already, in recent weeks, 75,000 federal workers have taken buyouts, though that's shy of the 100 to 200,000 workers. The White House said it hoped would resign. The Trump administration now telling federal agencies to fire probationary employees, who typically have only been with the government a year or two. The end goal? To cut $2 trillion from the annual federal budget. Federal employees don't cost the government anywhere close to that figure. We need to be very concerned about these tech billionaires merging with the state, the government, and basically taking over the government. Elon Musk is back to go.

我们将发现数千亿、甚至上千亿美元的欺诈和滥用行为。自特朗普总统上任以来，马斯克及其“政府效率部”（简称DOGE）迅速行动，解雇了成千上万的员工，马斯克警告说，可能还会有更多人被解雇。我们确实需要撤销整个机构。在最近的几周里，已有75,000名联邦工人接受了买断协议，虽然这还没达到白宫所希望的10万到20万员工辞职的目标。特朗普政府现在要求联邦机构解雇那些在见习期的员工，这些员工通常只为政府工作了一两年。最终目标？是从每年的联邦预算中削减2万亿美元。联邦雇员的成本远远达不到这个数字。我们需要非常关注这些科技大亨与国家和政府的合作，因为他们基本上是在接管政府。埃隆·马斯克正在继续他的计划。

But critics say Trump and Musk are moving too fast. They're just taking things down. And what they're going to have to do is they're going to have to put them back together again. Elaine K. Mark is a former Clinton administration official who oversaw large-scale cuts to federal spending in the 1990s. It took you eight years to cut something like 400,000 jobs. Elon Musk and President Trump are trying to cut something like 200,000 jobs in less than a month. Well, there's a simple reason for that. We cut fat, not muscle. We targeted functions that we didn't think were needed anymore. And we made sure that we had technology ready to take those to take the place of those jobs.

批评人士表示，特朗普和马斯克的行动过于仓促。他们只是简单地削减一些东西，而他们接下来需要做的是重新整合。Elaine K. Mark曾是克林顿政府官员，她曾在1990年代负责大规模削减联邦开支。那时用了八年时间才削减约40万个职位。而埃隆·马斯克和特朗普总统现在试图在不到一个月内削减约20万个职位。这其中有个简单的原因：我们当时削减的是多余的部分，而不是核心要素。我们针对的是那些不再需要的功能，同时确保有技术可以取代被削减的职位。

The dough's cuts are already facing a number of legal challenges. There could definitely be conflicts of interest for Elon Musk, most notably because he hasn't gone through the normal process for becoming a government employee. Musk's company SpaceX has billions in contracts with the US government, fearing astronauts and satellites to space while his electric car company Tesla has faced numerous federal investigations. But critics say it could take years for any legal challenges to play out in court. We're in the middle of a constitutional crisis.

这些削减已经面临许多法律挑战。埃隆·马斯克可能会存在利益冲突，这尤其体现在他没有通过正常程序成为政府雇员上。马斯克的公司SpaceX与美国政府之间有价值数十亿美元的合同，负责将宇航员和卫星送入太空，而他的电动汽车公司特斯拉则面临多项联邦调查。不过批评者表示，任何法律挑战可能需要多年时间才能在法庭上解决。我们正处于宪法危机之中。

Eventually, this will reach the Supreme Court. And I hope the court does the right thing before we get to the next problem. And the next problem is things blowing up in our faces. The Silicon Valley mantra, move fast and break things now playing out in real time inside the federal government. And Yamiche joins me now live. Yamiche, good morning. As you say, the courts have been rebuking Musk's efforts in some places in the absence of any real pushback from the Republican majorities in Congress. But are there other guardrails in place?

最终，这件事将会进入最高法院。我希望法庭能在我们遇到下一个问题之前采取正确的措施。下一个问题是事情可能会在我们面前失控。硅谷的格言“快速行动并打破常规”现在正在联邦政府内部实时上演。现在Yamiche正在现场与我们连线。Yamiche，早上好。正如你所说，在缺乏国会共和党多数派的有效抵制下，法院已经在某些地方驳回了马斯克的努力。但是否还有其他的保护措施？

Well, good morning, Willie. That's right. So far, several lawsuits have been filed in an effort to slow down these cuts by Elon Musk, notably on Thursday, a group of 14 states led by Democratic attorneys, generals, suit Musk and President Trump, calling Doge's actions unconstitutional. The suit also alleges the American people are now subject to quote, the whims of a single unelected billionaire. Unlike most high-profile and high-level government jobs, there was no congressional vetting or confirmation vote on Musk's new role. That could mean there aren't the normal recourses for issues like abuse of power. Meanwhile, President Trump has said he is personally checking to ensure that Musk has no conflicts of interest. And Trump has repeatedly said Musk answers to him. Willie.

早上好，Willie。是的，目前已经有数起诉讼被提起，目的是减缓埃隆·马斯克的这些削减措施。值得注意的是，在周四，由民主党律师总检察长领衔的14个州起诉了马斯克和特朗普总统，声称Doge的行为违宪。诉讼还称，美国人民现在受到一个未经过选举的亿万富翁的“个人意愿”摆布。与大多数高知名度和高级别政府职位不同，马斯克的新角色没有经过国会的审查或确认投票。这意味着，对于滥用权力等问题，可能没有正常的补救措施。同时，特朗普总统表示，他正在亲自检查，以确保马斯克没有利益冲突。而且特朗普多次表示，马斯克要向他负责。Willie。

Yeah, people will want more than Trump's word that there are no conflicts of interest. We'll see as this moves along. Yamiche, thanks so much. Listen.

是的，人们将希望得到的不仅仅是特朗普一句"没有利益冲突"的话。我们会在事情进展过程中看到更多内容。谢谢你，Yamiche。听着。