Podcaster Joe Rogan and Elon Musk, founder and chief executive of SpaceX and Tesla, Inc., who is heading up President Donald Trump’s DOGE, both agreed that it’s time for the United States to stop spending money it doesn’t have.
“We really need to stop spending money unless we’re sure it’s good value,” Musk said in a podcast interview with Rogan on “The Joe Rogan Experience” published on Friday.
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“So essentially, we’re like a poorly managed business with an unlimited credit line that is off the rails,” Rogan said.
“Absolutely,” Musk responded.
Musk’s email last weekend asking federal employees to list their five accomplishments over the past work week sparked controversy that was the talk of cable news and podcasts.
Rogan, who has previously said that he is not affiliated with any political party, said that Musk is doing what he does best.
“And if you were a person like you are who comes in and takes over businesses and straightens them out, that’s exactly what you’re doing,” Rogan said.
Rogan saw parallels between Musk’s measures with DOGE and his handling of X, formerly known as Twitter. In April 2022, Musk became the largest shareholder of X when he bought a 9.2% stake in the social media site.
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“I mean, most of the time, I create businesses from scratch,” Musk said. “Like Twitter was a case where, you know, I kind of bought a company that I kind of knew was a hair pull.”
Musk also took credit for making Tesla successful.
“Tesla did not exist in any meaningful form,” Musk said. “There were no employees. J. B. Straubel joined three other people, but there was no car, there was nothing.”
The company was also without a prototype, the tech mogul said.
“That’s a funny narrative, that people like to say that you didn’t even create Tesla,” Rogan said.
Musk said he and the DOGE have their work cut out for them.
“As bad as Twitter was, the federal government is much worse,” Musk said. “So you know, in the case of Twitter, it wasn’t a profitable company. It was like basically a break-even company, but at least it was break-even, and it had to pass an audit. The federal government is not break-even, it’s literally losing $2 trillion a year, and it does not pass its audits, it fails its own audits.”
