Less than a week into the new Donald Trump administration, Elon Musk’s “Department of Government Efficiency” is already losing employees.
The top lawyer in the pseudo-department, Bill McGinley, is leaving to work in the private sector, The Wall Street Journal reported Thursday. His departure follows Vivek Ramaswamy being pushed out of DOGE earlier this week for disagreeing with Musk over the department’s purpose.
“I am in discussions regarding a number of private sector opportunities and will have something to announce in the next couple of weeks,” McGinley said Thursday. “I support President Trump, Vice President Vance, and the great teams in the White House and across the administration 100 percent.”
McGinley, who served as Cabinet secretary in Trump’s first term, was initially Trump’s pick for White House counsel. But Trump later changed his mind and named McGinley as DOGE’s chief counsel in December, saying that the lawyer would assist in cutting regulations and reducing government spending.
So far, DOGE is the target of three lawsuits alleging that its creation breaks federal law due to its operating like a federal agency yet not following public transparency laws that agencies are required to follow. Meanwhile, Musk already has a White House email address and has been working in the West Wing this week, the Journal reports, with DOGE based out of the Eisenhower Executive Office Building.
With Ramaswamy’s and McGinley’s sudden departures, it seems that Musk’s vision for DOGE is clashing with others in Trump’s orbit as the group begins its work of slashing whatever Musk deems as waste in the federal government. With a deeply entrenched federal bureaucracy with allies in Congress, DOGE fights over prospective cuts are on the horizon, and more departures may soon follow.
