Elon Musk will attend Donald Trump's first cabinet meeting, White House confirms
25 February 2025, 18:54 | Updated: 25 February 2025, 19:32
Elon Musk will attend Donald Trump's first cabinet meeting on Wednesday, the White House has confirmed.
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The tech billionaire is not a cabinet secretary but was made head of the Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) in dismantling federal agencies.
Asked at a briefing on Tuesday if Musk would be attending, Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt said: "He is, as a matter of fact."
She said he would be there as he is working "alongside the president, our cabinet secretaries" and the "entire administration".
During the meeting, Musk will address "DOGE's efforts and how all of the cabinet secretaries are identifying waste, fraud and abuse at their respective agencies", Ms Leavitt added.
It comes after more than 20 civil service employees resigned from Musk's department on Tuesday, saying they were refusing to use their technical expertise to "dismantle critical public services".
"We swore to serve the American people and uphold our oath to the Constitution across presidential administrations," the 21 staff members wrote in a joint resignation letter.
"However, it has become clear that we can no longer honour those commitments."
The employees also warned that many of those enlisted by Musk to help slash the size of the federal government under Trump's administration were political ideologues who did not have the necessary skills or experience for the task ahead of them.
There has been a flurry of court challenges that have sought to stall, stop or unwind efforts to fire or coerce thousands of government workers out of jobs.
In a statement, Ms Leavitt previously said: "Anyone who thinks protests, lawsuits and lawfare will deter President Trump must have been sleeping under a rock for the past several years.
"President Trump will not be deterred from delivering on the promises he made to make our federal government more efficient and more accountable to the hardworking American taxpayers."