The richest man in the world headed up the Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) from the start of the second Trump administration, vowing to cut $1 trillion in public spending.

However, critics said his efforts to do so only hampered the role of government and left crucial departments dangerously under-resourced, while Musk also reportedly clashed with other administration members.

Recently, Musk said he would be reducing his political spending and stepping back from the role, as the value and brand of his company Tesla plummeted around the world and in the US.

Musk took to his social media site, X, to say his “scheduled time” as a special government employee had come to an end.

He said DOGE would stay active despite his departure.

Although it’s been claimed as a pre-planned departure, the change comes after Musk, initially an extremely prominent figure in Trump’s return to the Oval Office, became increasingly sidelined, and parted company with the president on a number of economic issues.

Musk said he was “disappointed” in the bill and that it was a case of major over-spending that would undermine the work of DOGE.

The multi-billionaire has also not been fully onboard with Trump’s wide-ranging tariff impositions in recent months, calling presidential trade adviser Peter Navarro “dumber than a sack of bricks”.

US House Speaker Mike Johnson thanked Musk for his work in the administration and pledged that the Republican-majority Congress would continue to cut spending based on DOGE’s findings.

If this truly is a scheduled departure, with Musk quietly departing as was planned all along after 130 days, it could be considered a triumph.

Trump’s first presidential term was notorious for rapid-swing hirings and firings by presidential edict, most famously in Anthony Scaramucci’s bombastic 11-day tenure as White House Communications Director. 

But so far, Trump’s second presidential term has been marked by a greater tendency to pick-and-stick, even in the face of mounting establishment criticism of figures such as Defence Secretary Pete Hegseth.

Musk was omnipresent during Trump’s time as president-elect, reportedly staying with him at Mar-a-Lago and even joining phone calls with world leaders.

He was also often at Trump’s side when the Republican returned to the White House post-inauguration, with the president even partaking in a display of Musk’s Tesla cars on the White House lawn.

Trump’s endorsement of DOGE, which despite the acronym was not a government department nor seemingly accountable to any process, kept Musk prominent as he set about slashing government jobs and programs.

As well as rapidly becoming unpopular around the US, many of Musk’s cuts triggered legal fightbacks that remain entangled in the courts.

Musk, who until recent years was publicly Democrat-leaning, came on board Trump’s 2024 presidential campaign with a US$250 million ($389 million) donation and a major social media force in the form of his online platform X.

It guaranteed him a place in the sun, but in recent months and weeks he has dropped further into the periphery of the administration, particularly as the Trump administration’s focus became international in the form of trade wars, and actual wars in Gaza and Ukraine.

Musk’s own plummeting popularity had also been considered a factor in the rapidly falling value of his electric car company Tesla, and he recently indicated he would cut back on political spending, saying, “I think I’ve done enough.

He also admitted to the Washington Post that he had fallen short of his goal of slashing US$1 trillion from the federal budget.

“The federal bureaucracy situation is much worse than I realised,” he said.

“I thought there were problems, but it sure is an uphill battle trying to improve things in DC, to say the least.”