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Elon Musk declared last month that the federal government was engaged in “utterly insane” activity, claiming without evidence that it had distributed $100 billion to people without Social Security numbers.
Two days after Mr. Musk’s comments, one of his key lieutenants, Steve Davis, began pressing the Social Security Administration for information.
Mr. Davis’s demand was “unprecedented,” Tiffany Flick, a former Social Security official, said in a sworn statement.
Deploying staff into federal agencies is just one task that Mr. Davis has carried out recently for Mr. Musk, as the world’s richest man continues an all-out effort to reshape the U.S. government.
At every turn, Mr. Davis has backed his boss, laying the groundwork for cost cutting during the presidential transition, slashing diversity initiatives, meeting lawmakers and helping to send a governmentwide “Fork in the Road” email that urged workers to resign.
Mr. Davis, 45, has been working for Mr. Musk for more than 20 years, following the billionaire to his various companies, including the rocket maker SpaceX and the social media platform X.
He is so loyal to Mr. Musk that he and his partner, Nicole Hollander, 42, who joined the General Services Administration to cut federal real estate costs, have set up a base of operations on the agency’s sixth floor in Washington. It is guarded by a full security detail.
Mr. Davis’s friends and colleagues describe him as a fun, outside-the-box thinker who has turned into a “blind servant” to Mr. Musk.
Mr. Davis began working for Mr. Musk in 2003, when the tech entrepreneur plucked him out of a Stanford aeronautics graduate program. He became the 14th employee at SpaceX and quickly endeared himself to Mr. Musk by finding less expensive ways to develop rocket parts.
His frugality led to mistakes. In 2007, Mr. Davis removed components from SpaceX’s Falcon 1 rocket that prevented fuel from sloshing inside the vehicle, three former colleagues said. That caused the fuel to unbalance the rocket during a test flight, and it shut down midair before reaching orbit.
By 2008, Mr. Davis had moved to Washington and was later named SpaceX’s director of advanced projects. He had a broad range of responsibilities at the company, including finding land around Boca Chica, Texas, for what would become Starbase, SpaceX’s rocket launch facility.
Mr. Davis also pursued an economics doctorate and opened Mr. Yogato, a frozen yogurt shop that offered discounts to customers who answered trivia questions. He also helped create a Jewish lifestyle website, Gather the Jews, and joined the board of the Atlas Society, a nonprofit dedicated to the teachings of the libertarian author Ayn Rand.
In 2018, Mr. Musk appointed Mr. Davis to lead the Boring Company, a start-up that aims to build tunnels under major metropolitan areas to ease congestion.
In 2022, Mr. Musk bought Twitter, and Mr. Davis helped slash the company’s costs, telling people that he hoped to eliminate more than $500 million. He was so dedicated that on some nights, he stayed with Ms. Hollander and their newborn baby at Twitter’s San Francisco office.
Mr. Davis also oversaw the installation of a personal bathroom for Mr. Musk there, telling one employee not to bother obtaining a construction permit.
Some workers complained about Mr. Davis’s cost cutting to Linda Yaccarino, who became X’s chief executive in 2023, and asked her to rein him in, two people with knowledge of the discussions said. He left X soon after.
When Mr. Musk stumped for Mr. Trump in Pennsylvania during last year’s presidential campaign, Mr. Davis relocated to hotels in Philadelphia and Pittsburgh to oversee a super PAC that Mr. Musk had backed, three people said. Mr. Davis helped conceive a $47-a-head petition that Mr. Musk promoted to turn out Trump voters, and cited his Twitter cost cutting as a way of doing things cheaply at the super PAC.
After Mr. Trump won the election, Mr. Davis joined a transition “landing team” and interviewed candidates for Mr. Musk’s efficiency commission. He also met with agencies that employed engineers to assess the technical talent that DOGE might tap, three government officials said.
Mr. Davis pushed administration officials to let him email all government employees at once, two people with knowledge of his efforts said. That led to a January email blast known as the “Fork in the Road,” which included a governmentwide resignation offer.
When leaks about the resignation offer circulated in the media, Mr. Davis rebuked officials for not controlling their staffs and accused them of embarrassing Mr. Musk, two people said.
Mr. Davis pushes for Mr. Musk’s priorities daily with Mr. Trump’s advisers, two people with knowledge of the conversations said. He has alerted administration officials to diversity, equity and inclusion programs that are targeted for cuts and individuals to be removed from government boards.
Mr. Davis, who can be blunt and undiplomatic, especially in late-night texts, has also clashed with some of Mr. Trump’s staff. He and his colleagues upset some White House advisers with the way DOGE tried to place some of their recruits at the Pentagon, three people said.
Throughout, Mr. Davis has studiously avoided attention. Mr. Musk and the White House have not mentioned him. In Washington, Mr. Davis mostly avoided having his picture taken until this month, when he spoke at the DOGE Caucus, a House of Representatives group that works with the cost-cutting task force.
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