As former President Donald Trump unveiled five pillars of a second-term economic plan on Thursday, one of his proposals seemed to garner more attention than any other: a vow to appoint Elon Musk the head of a new commission on government efficiency.
Speaking to The Economic Club of New York, the former president offered up his usual doom and gloom about the current economy, blaming Vice President Kamala Harris for rising inflation and the surge in illegal immigration.
“I will create a government efficiency commission tasked with conducting a complete financial and performance audit of the entire federal government and making recommendations for drastic reforms,” Trump said, noting that the commission came “at the suggestion of Elon Musk, who has given me his complete and total endorsement.”
“We need to do it,” Trump said. “Can’t go on the way we are now.”
Musk has previously said he plans to donate around $45 million a month to a super PAC supporting Trump, though he’s also appeared to waver on the commitment by saying he would give at a “much lower level.”
Still, as Trump runs for president for a third consecutive election, Musk has emerged as a powerful ally, arguing to elect Trump on a near-daily basis on X — the social media platform Musk owns.
Trump said the commission would be “tasked with conducting a complete financial and performance audit of the entire federal government and making recommendations for drastic reforms.”
“This would unlock tremendous prosperity for America,” Musk said on X in response to the announcement.
Trump also claimed that the commission would “develop an action plan to totally eliminate fraud and improper payments within six months,” claiming — without providing evidence — that it would “save trillions of dollars.”
Trump also made news by promising to create a new sovereign wealth fund that would be funded by tariffs. Trump’s idea, similar to the sovereign wealth fund in Saudi Arabia, would be used to invest in “great national endeavors.”
“Everything from highways to airports and to transportation infrastructure, all of the future,” Trump said, promising to invest in “state-of-the-art manufacturing hubs, advanced defense capabilities” and medical research.
“Why don’t we have a wealth fund? Other countries have wealth funds. We have nothing,” Trump said. “We have nothing. We’re going to have a sovereign wealth fund, or we can name it something different.”
“We’ll have the greatest sovereign wealth fund of them all,” Trump said in characteristic fashion.
Trump also pledged to rescind all unspent funds from the Inflation Reduction Act and said he would “cut 10 old regulations for every one new regulation.”
He also promised that he would make the Trump tax cuts permanent and lower the corporate tax rate from 21% to 15% for companies that “make their product in America.” (Trump’s signature legislative achievement during his first term was tax cuts, which lowered the corporate tax rate from 35% to 21% in 2017.)
In a memo obtained by NOTUS, Brian Nelson, the top economic adviser to the Harris campaign, pushed back on Trump’s economic plan, saying that it would “cost trillions and hurt the middle class.”
Nelson said Trump “wants our economy to serve billionaires and big corporations.”
“He is throwing out proposal after proposal to give them massive tax windfalls and even promised some executives to make them richer in exchange for their campaign contributions,” Nelson said.
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Reese Gorman is a reporter at NOTUS.