President Donald Trump on Wednesday said he has put Elon Musk in charge of the Department of Government Efficiency, appearing to contradict the White House over who runs the cost-cutting agency.
The White House said in a court filing Monday that Musk's role in the Trump administration was that of a White House employee and senior adviser to the president, he had no authority over DOGE and was not an employee of the agency.
The White House declared this to a judge in a case filed by Democrat attorneys general against Musk and DOGE.
Trump appeared to contradict at least part of the White House assertion Wednesday.
"I signed an order creating the Department of Government Efficiency and put a man named Elon Musk in charge," Trump told an audience of investors and company executives in Miami.
Trump has repeatedly talked about Musk as the functional leader of DOGE, which is not a cabinet-level department, featuring him in a news conference at the White House this month to answer questions about the program.
Trump on his first day in office set up the cost-cutting body in an executive order that did not say who its "administrator" would be. White House officials this week have not answered repeated requests to identify the administrator.
DOGE has swept through federal agencies since Trump began his second term as president last month. Musk, owner of Tesla, SpaceX and X, was put in charge of rooting out what the White House called wasteful spending as part a dramatic overhaul of federal government that has included thousands of job cuts.