Elon Musk wants a golden audit.
The world’s richest man got encouragement Sunday to bring his cost-cutting Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) into one of the most secure places in the world: Fort Knox.
Sen. Rand Paul called for a review of the massive gold reserves — worth an estimated $425 billion based on market rates — in response to the tech mogul’s musings about the stash.
Musk, 53, drew attention to a user who asked him to “take a look inside Fort Knox just to make sure the 4,580 tons of US gold is there.”
“Surely it’s reviewed at least every year,” Musk replied to X user Zerohedge.
“Nope. Let’s do it,” Paul (R-Ky.), 62, chimed in, referring to the Army installation south of Louisville.
The Kentucky senator’s father, former Rep. Ron Paul (R-Texas), a big gold bug, had previously pressed government officials for greater transparency on the country’s reserves.
It’s unclear the last time the facility underwent a comprehensive audit, the vaults were totally off-limits for decades.
The first tour of the facility came in 1974 when journalists and a Congressional delegation were allowed in following claims the stores had been looted. The vaults were opened again in 2017, during the last Trump administration, for Treasury Secretary Steve Mnuchin to view them.
Fort Knox has at least 147.3 million ounces — 9.2 million lbs. — worth of gold sitting in its vaults, according to the US Mint. That’s about half of the Treasury’s reserve gold.
(The largest gold vault in the world is actually in Lower Manhattan at the Federal Reserve Bank of New York Building, but that also houses gold from other governments.)
The government asses the book value of $42.22 per ounce, totaling about $6.2 billion worth of gold in Fort Knox.
But that’s almost a comical undervalue; gold is currently trading at nearly $2,900 per troy ounce after skyrocketing in the last year — meaning the stash is worth hundreds of billions.
Gold began arriving at Fort Knox in 1937. The largest amount of gold that had been stashed in the Kentucky-based Army installation was 649.6 million ounces in late 1941, per its website.
Fort Knox is heavily fortified. The US government claims that the precious metal bullion’s structure and content are “known by only a few” and “no one person knows all the procedures to open the vault.”
The Kentucky-based facility’s bullion depository, which stores other valuable objects to the US government besides gold, does not allow visitors and has rarely been opened to the public.
During World War II, it was used to safeguard the Bill of Rights, Declaration of Independence and Constitution. The founding documents were returned to Washington, DC, when the war concluded.
Musk has been busy conducting what is essentially an audit of the federal government’s spending as part of his DOGE team.
President Trump has suggested that Musk’s DOGE team began with about “12 geniuses” and has since ballooned to “almost 100 people.”
The Post contacted reps for Fort Knox and the US Mint for comment.
