Just 33% of US adults have a favourable view of Musk, the chain-saw-wielding, late-night-posting, campaign-hat-wearing public face of President Donald Trump’s efforts to downsize and overhaul the federal government. That share is down from 41% in December.
The poll found that about two-thirds of adults believe Musk has held too much influence over the federal government during the past few months — although that influence may be coming to an end. The billionaire entrepreneur is expected to leave his administration job in the coming weeks.Also read: Whistleblower org says DOGE may have caused ‘significant cyber breach’ at US labor watchdog
Musk is noticeably less popular than the overall effort to pare back the government workforce, which Trump has described as bloated and corrupt. About half of US adults believe the Republican president has gone too far on reducing the size of the federal workforce, while roughly 3 in 10 think he is on target and 14% want him to go even further.
Much of the downsizing has been done through the so-called Department of Government Efficiency, or DOGE, which was Musk’s brainchild during last year’s campaign. Thousands of federal employees have been fired or pushed to quit, contracts have been cancelled, and entire agencies have been brought to a standstill.
Musk has succeeded in providing a dose of shock therapy to the federal government, but he has fallen short of other goals. After talking about cutting spending by $1 trillion, he has set a much lower target of $150 billion. Even reaching that amount could prove challenging, and DOGE has regularly overstated its progress.He is expected to start dedicating more time to Tesla, his electric automaker that has suffered plummeting revenue while he was working for Trump. Musk told investors on a recent conference call that “now that the major work of establishing the Department of Government Efficiency is done,” he expects to spend just “a day or two per week on government matters.”
Also read: Tesla sales drop 13% in first quarter as Elon Musk backlash, aging models hurt demand
Musk, in his work for the administration, has continued a political evolution toward the right. Although the South African-born entrepreneur was never easy to categorise ideologically, he championed the fight against climate change and often supported Democratic candidates.
Now he criticises “the woke mind virus” and warns of the collapse of Western civilisation from the threats of illegal migration and excess government spending.
Musk’s increasingly conservative politics are reflected in the polling. Only about 2 in 10 independents and about 1 in 10 Democrats view Musk favorably, compared with about 7 in 10 Republicans.
In addition, while about 7 in 10 independents and about 9 in 10 Democrats believe Musk has too much influence, only about 4 in 10 Republicans feel that way.
Republicans are much less likely than Democrats to be worried about being affected by recent cuts to federal government agencies, services or grants. Just 11% said they are “extremely” or “very” concerned that they or someone they know will be affected, while about two-thirds of Democrats and 44% of independents have those fears.
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