Senate Republicans urged Elon Musk on Wednesday to better coordinate with them, with many suggesting the tech billionaire send Congress a package of proposed spending cuts to enshrine the work of his Department of Government Efficiency initiative.
The message was delivered during a closed-door lunch organized by Florida Sen. Rick Scott in the latest instance of congressional Republicans, who have generally praised his efforts, counseling Musk to more closely loop in lawmakers.
The meeting came just hours after the Supreme Court rebuffed the Trump administration in one of several outstanding legal fights over spending cuts. Republicans warned that the flurry of court challenges, as well as a constant drip of stories about DOGE slashing key jobs, is muddying their political message.
“We need to capture this in the legislative process to make it real,” said Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.). “It’s time for the White House now to go on offense. We’re losing altitude here. We started off good. We’re losing altitude. We need to get back on the game, on offense.”
The way to do that, Graham added, is to “take the work product and vote on it.”
Inside the room, Sen. Rand Paul (R-Ky.) said he urged Musk to have the White House send Congress a package of proposed spending clawbacks, known as rescissions. Other GOP senators described Musk as “elated” by the idea once he realized it could get through the Senate with a simple majority.
“I love what Elon is doing … but to make it real, to make it go beyond the moment of the day, it needs to come back in the form of a rescission package,” Paul told reporters after the meeting.
According to two GOP senators, Musk acknowledged that DOGE’s spending cuts would only be temporary unless they were backed up by action in Congress.
“He said, ‘Yeah, you know, unless Congress takes action on this, none of it is permanent.’ So that is the point of rescissions,” Sen. Josh Hawley (R-Mo.). “He said he urges Congress to take action particularly after the court [ruling] today.”
Musk also told senators how to contact him with questions about DOGE’s work or concerns about his proposed job cuts, sharing his cell phone number at one point, attendees said. He also heard in the room that DOGE needs to better coordinate with Congress, an increasingly frequent refrain that has come even from Trump’s congressional allies.
Some GOP senators, including Majority Leader John Thune, have publicly indicated they want a more balanced relationship between DOGE and Trump’s Senate-confirmed Cabinet picks. According to three GOP senators present, Musk suggested that he’s working more closely with agencies to make decisions about cuts.
Sen. John Hoeven (R-N.D.) said Musk acknowledged that “of course they’re going to make mistakes.”
“Of course they are going to have to make adjustments,” Hoeven said. “This is a process.”
Graham added that the “the system needs to be fine-tuned to coordinate between DOGE and Congress and the administration.” And that senators urged Musk to be better about knocking down “what’s true and what’s not true” and otherwise address their concerns.
“They’re going to try to create a system where members of Congress can call some central group and get that fixed quickly,” Graham said.
