The Pentagon is preparing for its turn under Elon Musk’s microscope. Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth and Republicans in the Senate are ready for it — so long as it isn’t like what Musk’s team did to USAID.
“We can’t say, ‘It’d be more efficient,’ but not be ready to go fight a war. We’ve got to still be prepared,” Sen. James Lankford told NOTUS.
Musk and his Department of Government Efficiency have taken a blunt instrument to large swathes of the federal government, attempting to shut down agencies, slash funding and end programs deemed out of line with President Donald Trump’s agenda. Republicans on Capitol Hill have backed up the DOGE mission — even while admitting it’s “breaking” parts of government.
But when it comes to the Pentagon, their support for Musk’s small team of cost-cutters comes with some caveats.
“While we’re certainly looking for efficiencies, there are security concerns,” Sen. Roger Wicker, the chair of the Senate Armed Services Committee, told NOTUS.
Wicker said he wants to see the department take steps to limit waste, but the fact that much of the military’s work is classified means its internal operations should be handled very carefully.
“I hope the administration and Mr. Musk can be mindful of that,” he said.
Hegseth told reporters Tuesday that DOGE wouldn’t interfere with his department’s mission of national defense.
“There’s plenty of places where we want the keen eye of DOGE, but we’ll do it in coordination. We’re not going to do things that are to the detriment of American operational or tactical capabilities,” Hegseth said while traveling in Germany. “The Defense Department is not USAID.”
Lawmakers are depending on Hegseth to keep the DOGE efforts in line.
“I have a lot of confidence in [Hegseth] to sort of make sure that they’re getting a lot of cost savings there. He’s working with the audit team,” said Sen. Josh Hawley, remarking that he hopes the Pentagon won’t be left like foreign aid programs. “But also making sure that the day-to-day operations continue,” he said.
Hegseth said he and Musk have already spoken. The defense secretary also threw out some examples of climate-change-focused programs and “the way we acquire weapons systems, procurement” as places for new efficiency.
“Where we can find billions of dollars, and he’s right to say billions, every dollar we save there is a dollar that goes to war-fighters, and that’s good for the American people,” Hegseth said.
Other Republicans in the Senate also said they had suggestions. It hasn’t been DOGE’s style to get Congress involved in its push to cut authorized funds — a reality that’s raised a lot of legal scrutiny over the administration’s actions.
Still, Sen. Joni Ernst told NOTUS she was “very, very excited … to see a lot of the waste eliminated. We’ll make it leaner, more efficient.”
Ernst said she’s been collecting information for the past decade that she wants to share with Musk “and his DOGE team” once they start making cuts.
As chair of the Senate DOGE caucus and a senior member of the Senate Armed Services Committee, Ernst pointed to the acquisitions process as adding “billions of dollars onto platforms that don’t need to be there.”
As for the Democrats, Sen. Jack Reed, the ranking member of the Armed Services Committee, had a related concern to Wicker’s warning about security. Reed said he was worried about allies abroad seeing “renegade computer folks running around the Pentagon unleashed,” discouraging information sharing of critical and classified materials, he told NOTUS.
Within the Pentagon’s walls, security is tight, and for good reason.
“There’s some very practical issues,” Reed said. “They want into these systems with their own computers, and no one is allowed anywhere in the Pentagon’s secure areas that I know of with personal electronic equipment. So are we going to undermine the basic security protections for everyone?”
Sen. Tim Kaine agreed.“I just hope that they have every bit of classified information under lock and key,” he said. “They should not have access to anything classified.”
Musk does hold a “Top Secret” clearance from his work with the military through SpaceX.
While there’s some nervousness around how Musk is going to execute his efficiencies, not all Republicans are as worried.
“I think it’s absolutely necessary,” Sen. Todd Young said. “If we can responsibly turn the Pentagon into a triangle, I’m all for it.”
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John T. Seward is a NOTUS reporter and an Allbritton Journalism Institute fellow.
Correction: A previous version of this article misattributed Sen. Todd Young’s comments on DOGE’s anticipated focus on the Pentagon.