Sen. Patty Murray (D-Wash.) said that tech billionaire Elon Musk and President Trump are “proving every single day they do not know what they are doing.”
“Elon Musk and Donald Trump are proving every single day they do not know what they are doing, and they do not know what our federal workers actually do, and they don’t care if their firing spree ends up burning down something really important,” Murray said in a video posted to YouTube Wednesday.
According to a press release from the Evergreen State senator, the comments from Murray occurred amid a virtual press conference.
“Just this week, they fired another 1,400 staff at the VA, people who are helping serve our veterans gone, for no reason,” Murray said later in the video. “And here’s the thing, they are still trying to fire even more people with even less forethought. The Trump-Musk firing spree continues to be as surgical as a wrecking ball.”
During the first meeting of President Trump’s Cabinet on Wednesday, Musk defended his recent email requesting federal workers divulge their accomplishments to his office and referred to it as a “pulse check.”
The tech billionaire said he requested the emails from federal workers about their accomplishments so he could ensure people getting paychecks show they are actually working.
“There are fictional individuals collecting paychecks,” the tech billionaire said about the government. “Are they alive, and can they write an email?”
Senate Republicans earlier this week expressed distaste with the email directive from Musk, with Sen. Shelley Moore Capito (R-W.Va.) saying she didn’t believe “it was handled very well in terms of the surprise element of it or what the point of it was.”
The Hill has reached out to the White House for comment.
