Elizabeth Warren tells Elon Musk she’s ‘happy’ to work with him on DOGE’s goals to slash government waste. She has 30 recommendations.

• Sen. Elizabeth Warren told Elon Musk she will work with DOGE to slash wasteful federal spending.

• Her recommendations to cut spending included reducing the defense budget and fraud in federal programs.

• There’s growing bipartisan support to work with DOGE on achieving its spending cut goals.

Sen. Elizabeth Warren said she’s “happy” to work with her sometimes sparring partner, Elon Musk, to cut wasteful federal spending.

On Thursday, Warren sent a letter to Musk — who is leading President Donald Trump’s new Department of Government Efficiency, or DOGE — detailing 30 recommendations to reduce government spending, including taking aim at the Department of Defense budget, fraud in Medicare programs, and education funding for for-profit schools.

Musk and his former DOGE co-lead Vivek Ramaswamy originally proposed slashing $2 trillion in federal spending, but Musk later walked back that goal and said during an interview in early January that DOGE has “got a good shot” of reaching $1 trillion in cuts.

While Warren said that she disagrees with some of Musk’s initial proposals to cut spending, like reducing veterans’ benefits, she said that she agrees with Musk that there is too much wasteful federal spending.

“If you are serious about working together in good faith to cut government spending — in a way that does not harm the middle class — I have proposals for your consideration,” Warren said.

One of Warren’s recommendations included cutting spending at the Department of Defense, which makes up 14% of total government spending, per year-to-date Treasury data. It’s an idea that’s already gained bipartisan support — Democratic Rep. Ro Khanna called out contractors overcharging the department in a December opinion piece and said he would work with DOGE, while GOP Sen. Joni Ernst also expressed her support for cutting defense spending in a November letter.

Musk has also previously been critical of defense spending and said it’s “not sustainable” during a November speech.

One of Warren’s other recommendations was to crack down on fraud in healthcare programs. Some policy experts previously told BI that rooting out fraud in programs like Medicare could be an area for a quick DOGE win, as Musk can leverage his Silicon Valley tech experience to help root out fraudulent and improper payments in federal programs.

Warren’s letter to Musk comes amid their long-running public disputes, and her recommendations contain many of her signature positions that Musk and some GOP lawmakers are unlikely to support. They include eliminating charter school funding, restricting federal grants to for-profit universities, and closing tax loopholes for the wealthy. Warren previously singled out Musk as one of many billionaires who should pay more in taxes.

Musk and the White House did not immediately respond to a request for comment from Business Insider.

Other recommendations for DOGE cuts

Trump officially established DOGE as an office within the White House in a Monday executive order. DOGE’s mission in the order is narrower than originally proposed — it would focus on modernizing IT systems — and it’s unclear how exactly the agency will initiate spending cuts.

Still, economic experts and policymakers have continued to outline areas Musk should target. William Gale, a senior fellow at the progressive Urban-Brookings Tax Policy Center, wrote in a Wednesday opinion piece that DOGE should scrutinize tax expenditures, which can take the form of tax credits and deductions, and “they can go on for years with no public attention or review,” Gale wrote.

Democratic and Republican lawmakers also have ideas. Democratic Rep. Jared Moskowitz previously told BI that he wants to target reorganizing the Department of Homeland Security to allow FEMA and the Secret Service to report directly to the president, simplifying the chain of command.

“If this is where that conversation is going to happen, I’m happy to be at the table,” Moskowitz said. “And if they want to do stupid stuff, I’ll call it out, and I’ll vote against it.”

Ernst’s November spending cut recommendations also included eliminating vacant federal buildings, auditing the Internal Revenue Service, and reducing fraud in SNAP benefits.

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