The acting commissioner of the Social Security Administration, Michelle King, has left her job after clashing with Elon Musk's Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) over its bid to access sensitive records, The Washington Post reported on Sunday, citing three people familiar the departure.

White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt defended Musk's efforts on Sunday, saying President Donald Trump had directed him and DOGE to identify fraud at the Social Security Administration.

"They haven't dug into the books yet, but they suspect that there are tens of millions of deceased people who are receiving fraudulent Social Security payments," she told Fox News.

Leavitt said DOGE was aiming to identify duplicate payments and to end them, identify payments going to dead people and to protect the integrity of the system.