For nearly three months. Elon Musk cut a swath through the nation’s capital with little care for rules or tradition.
Literally and metaphorically, he took a chainsaw to some of America’s great institutions.
And then he did what he often does. He left.
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Now it’s up to the lawyers, judges, and bean counters to make sense of what’s left behind. His Department of Government Efficiency guerrilla raids on the heart of government no doubt uncovered some waste and fraud, although not nearly as much as he predicted.
Musk’s original boast of slashing $2 trillion ended with a more somber figure approaching $150 billion. When considering the sheer scale of the state’s entitlement programs, the savings remains a drop in the ocean of public spending.
Besides, it’s not really saving money that drives the world’s richest man. It’s making it.
It’s not altogether clear why the Batman and Robin partnership in the White House ended so suddenly. There was no joker in the pack waiting to usurp Musk.
But the television producer in Donald Trump knew that the pilot presidency had run its course, and the chaos theory that surrounded Musk could not last four months, let alone four years.
The X factor simply could not be controlled, whether it was letting his son wipe boogers on the Resolute desk or ripping into Cabinet members in the West Wing.
Government sums need to add up, however large. Even deficits fit into a column. Grand gestures don’t balance the books.
And Musk, 53, could never get his head around the fact that he couldn’t do as he pleased. Too many people were watching this time. Too many people didn’t like what he was doing.
His businesses were bleeding, and it just wasn’t fun anymore.
Sources say there was no big farewell. No drama. It was time. And it won’t be long before Musk’s DOGE minions follow him onto the next big thing. “The president genuinely wishes him well,” said one White House insider. “I’m not exactly sure about everyone else.”
Out of sight, remarkably, has meant out of mind. He is still posting obsessively on his X platform, and it’s not that people don’t care; it’s just not as relevant when he isn’t peddling Teslas by the Rose Garden or playing air guitar at Trump rallies.
Few could question Musk’s brilliance. His business empire reflects the choices of a wildly imaginative child. Electric cars, space ships, robots, social media…tunnels.
But his departure to his new six-bedroom, 6,900-square-foot mansion in Texas does offer some insight into the mind and the madness of Musk.
It couldn’t be more different than the shining beacon on the hill. For a start, it’s in a dip.
If the original pioneers were choosing a safe place to rest in Texas on the way out West, they couldn’t pick a worse spot.
“The property sits on an uneven topography and the actual home sits below street level resulting in clear, unobstructed views of the home and the yard from the street; thus, unless there is a physical barrier in place, the property would be completely exposed and would compromise the resident’s security and privacy,” says a report by the planning commission in West Lake Hills, the suburb of Austin, where Musk bought his not-so-hideaway home in 2022.
In some countries, the term “cowboy” has connotations other than a hard-working, Marlboro-smoking cattle herder on his trusty steed. It can mean someone with a contempt for the rules.
Musk built a massive border around his Texas property to keep out prying eyes. He has two other properties in the area, and there is speculation he wants to raise his growing brood of children in the Lone Star State.
But he didn’t bother with the permits. The pedestrian gate and surrounding wall are 9 feet 2 inches high—3 feet 2 inches higher than allowed—and a fence along the property line is 16.5 feet in height, which is 10.5 feet higher than permitted. All in all, there were six code violations.
Now his neighbors are complaining, and someone has to clean up the mess.
Tisha Ritter, who is representing Musk, wrote to the West Lake Hills City Council to try and strike a deal to get around the violations. “Our request is driven by the necessity to address critical security concerns rather than aesthetic or commercial interests,” Ritter wrote on March 3. “As a high profile public official, the property’s resident faces ongoing security threats, making proactive safety measures imperative.
“The existing fencing and gate system were thoughtfully designed to provide essential protection while preserving the neighborhood’s character and minimizing impact on surrounding properties.”
The neighbors weren’t impressed. They opposed “any and all variances request to be granted,” according to a local news outlet. Three homeowners wrote letters to the council rejecting any compromise.
One of them, Paul Hemmer, said any allowances made would “do nothing but just facilitate their bad behavior on our quiet little cul-de-sac, which at times appears to be a parking lot with many cars parked every which way.
“Shift change happens three times a day, with cars coming and going, along with most of these employees ordering food deliveries all hours of the night and day,” Hemmer said at the meeting.
“I’m astounded that the staff is putting forth any kind of suggestion that we bend based on who is asking, because Westlake is full of important people,” one planning commissioner was reported as saying about the area. “We are not here to judge personal needs of the occupants. We’re here to judge physical needs of the land.”
The planning commission voted against making any exceptions for the billionaire owner.
Musk will have to wait until a June 11 planning meeting to discover if he will be ordered to take down the fence and start again.
If only it were so easy for the federal government to get a makeover for the devastation wreaked in Washington by one man’s relentless crusade for change.
