Elon Musk said last month that the Federal Government was engaged in “absolutely crazy” activities, supporting without evidence that he had distributed $ 100 billion to people without social security numbers.
Two days after the comments of Mr. Musk, one of his key lieutenants, Steve Davis, started pressing the administration of social security for information. Davis defined the leaders of the agency to insist that he offers a young engineer from the so -called Department of Musk government efficiency at database that contained sensitive information on the Americans.
Davis’s question was “unprecedented”, Tiffany Flick, a former social security official, said in a sworn declaration this month for a cause intended by federal employees who tried to block access to data. He added that Mr. Davis could hear impatiently in the hours preceding the doge engineer in the end was allowed to investigate “the general myth of the alleged fraud of widespread social security”.
Distributing the staff in federal agencies is only a task that Mr. Davis has recently carried out for Mr. Musk, since the richest man in the world continues an all -round effort to remodel the United States government. At each turn, Mr. Davis supported his boss, laying the foundations for cutting costs during the presidential transition, cutting the initiatives of diversity, meeting the legislators and helping to send an e -mail of “road fork” at the government level that invited workers to resign.
These actions show how Mr. Davis, 45, has actually become the daily leader of Doge. He has more power than Amy Gleason, the administrator of the acting of the Trump administration, said two people close to the effort, adding that Mrs. Gleason was sometimes in the dark on the decisions of Mr. Davis.
The way Mr. Davis has arrived in this position is certainly not a secret. For more than 20 years, the engineer has dedicated himself to the wishes of Mr. Musk, following the billionaire to his various companies, including the Maker Spacex rocket and the Social Media X platform. Mr. Davis believes with all his heart
For Mr. Musk, Mr. Davis represents the ideal employee – an engineer who will launch himself into any task, even if he has no experience in the area, said two former colleagues. Mr. Musk particularly praised Mr. Davis’s ability to caress the waste, once by comparing his lieutenant to a treatment to kill cancer.
“Steve is like chemotherapy,” Musk said during a transition meeting before President Trump came into office. “A little chemotherapy can save you life; a lot of chemo could kill you.”
Mr. Musk and Mr. Davis have united deeply on costs. In Spacex, Mr. Davis conceived ways to build rockets in a cheaper way. He also supervised the layoffs on Twitter, who was renamed X. A doge, he is coordinating engineers and lawyers to find $ 2 trillions that Musk has promised to eliminate from the federal budget.
Mr. Davis is so faithful to Mr. Musk that he and his partner, Nicole Hollander, 42 years old, who joined the administration of general services to cut federal real estate costs, have established a basis for operations on the sixth plan of the agency in Washington. It is supervised by a complete security detail, three employees of the agency said.
Adam Green, a progressive organizer who has made friends with Mr. Davis about a decade ago when they lived in Washington, said Mr. Davis was once a “funny thinker out of the box”, who had turned into a “blind servant” for Mr. Musk.
Mr. Davis, Mr. Musk, Mrs. Hollander and the White House did not respond to requests for comment.
Davis started working for Mr. Musk in 2003, when the technological entrepreneur tear him out of a Stanford aeronautical degree program. Mr. Davis became the 14th Spacex employee. He quickly accompanied himself by Mr. Musk finding less expensive ways to develop parts of rockets, including creating a shuttle steering device for a penny of the price.
His frugality has led to errors. In 2007, Davis removed the components from the Spacex Falcon 1 rocket which prevented fuel from sliding inside the vehicle, said three former colleagues. This made the rocket unbalanced the fuel during a test flight and closed in mid -air before reaching the orbit.
In 2008, Davis had moved to Washington and later had been appointed director of the advanced Spacex projects. He had a wide range of responsibility at the company, including the search for land around Boca Chica, Texas, for what Starbase would become, the Spacex missile launch structure.
On the side, Mr. Davis pursued a doctorate of economics and opened Mr. Yogato, a frozen yogurt shop that offered discounts to customers who answered questions to curiosity. He also contributed to creating a Jewish lifestyle website, collecting Jews and joined the advice of the Atlas Society, a non -profit organization dedicated to the teachings of the libertarian author Ayn Rand.
In 2018, Musk appointed Mr. Davis to guide Boring Company, a start-up that aims to build tunnels under the main metropolitan areas to relieve congestion.
“In general there is almost no zero research and development in tunnel in America,” said Davis during a presentation for the company that year. “So trying new things is actually useful for us.”
The boring company opened a tunnel in Las Vegas in 2021, but came across the roadblocks of the regulatory roads elsewhere. This frustrated Mr. Musk, who scolded Mr. Davis and threatened to fire him, three people who worked with Mr. Davis. Stress weighed Mr. Davis and sometimes he pulled his hair out, five people said near him.
After Mr. Musk bought Twitter in 2022, Mr. Davis helped reduce the company’s costs, telling people who hoped to eliminate more than $ 500 million. It was so dedicated that in some nights, he remained with Mrs. Hollander and their newborn at the San Francisco office in Twitter.
Mr. Davis also supervised the installation of a personal bathroom for Mr. Musk there, telling an employee not to worry about obtaining a construction permit.
“We must not follow the rules,” said Davis, according to a 2023 cause of former Twitter workers who accused the company and Mr. Musk to violate the terms of their work agreements.
Some workers complained about the cutting of the costs of Mr. Davis to Linda Yaccarino, who became CEO of X in 2023, and asked her to reincaric, two people with knowledge of the discussions said. He left x shortly after.
When Mr. Musk disconcerted Mr. Trump in Pennsylvania during the presidential campaign last year, Davis moved to the hotel in Filadelfia and Pittsburgh to supervise a Super Pac that Mr. Musk had supported, three people said. Mr. Davis helped conceived a $ 47 petition that Musk promoted to demonstrate Trump’s voters and mentioned his twitter cut as a way to do things cheap at the Super Pac.
After Trump won the elections, Davis joined a transition “landing team” and interviewed the candidates for the commission for the efficiency of Mr. Musk. He also met agencies who employed engineers to evaluate the technical talent that doge could touch, three government officials said. Mr. Musk included Davis in recruiting shots for potential government hiring, according to an internal and internal email seen by the New York Times.
After the inauguration of Mr. Trump, Davis pushed the administration officials to let him send an and -mail to all government employees, two people with knowledge of his efforts. This led to an explosion of e -mail in January known as “Fork on the road”, which included a resignation offer throughout the government.
When the losses on the resignation offer circulated in the media, Davis reproached officials for not having checked their staff and accused them of embarrassing Mr. Musk, said two people.
Davis daily pushes the priorities of Mr. Musk with the councilors of Mr. Trump, two people with knowledge of the conversations. He has warned officials of the administration of the programs of diversity, equity and inclusion that are targeted for cuts and individuals to be removed from government councils.
Mr. Davis, who can be frank and indexed, especially in late night texts, also collided with part of the staff of Mr. Trump. He and his colleagues shocked some councilors of the White House with the way doge tried to place some of their recruits at the Pentagon, three people said.
During all, Mr. Davis avoided attention. Mr. Musk and the White House did not mention it. In Washington, Mr. Davis mostly avoided having taken his photo until this month, when he spoke to the Doge Caucus, a group of the House of Representatives who works with the Task Force of cost reduction.
“He concluded a great meeting with @elonmusk and Steve Davis on their goals for the @Doge”, the representative Aaron Bean, republican of Florida, published on X. The message included a photo of Mr. Davis with a microphone and smile next to Mr. Musk.
The report was contributed by Kirsten Grind, Eric Schmitt, Jonathan Swan AND Maggie Haberman. Susan C. Beachy Research contribution.