Two Billionaires’ Big Plan to Shrink Government

Elon Musk and Vivek Ramaswamy have called the federal bureaucracy an “existential threat to our republic.” Now, President-elect Donald J. Trump is empowering them to drastically shrink it, by whatever means necessary.

David A. Fahrenthold, an investigative reporter for The New York Times, discusses their plans — and what it would look like if they were actually carried out.

Guest: David A. Fahrenthold, an investigative reporter for The New York Times.

Background reading:

• The so-called Department of Government Efficiency has advantages that past budget cutters did not • , but laws and court challenges could still make change slow and difficult.

For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily. Transcripts of each episode will be made available by the next workday.

For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily. Transcripts of each episode will be made available by the next workday.

Subscribe today at nytimes.com/podcasts or on Apple Podcasts, Spotify and Amazon Music. You can also subscribe via your favorite podcast app here https://www.nytimes.com/activate-access/audio?source=podcatcher. For more podcasts and narrated articles, download The New York Times app at nytimes.com/app.

Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.