President Donald Trump grants special privileges to billionaire Elon Musk, US government continues to lay off “massive”

The announcement came as the president gave Elon Musk a key role in his first cabinet meeting and discussed ambitious budget-cutting targets.

The White House issued a memo asking agencies to submit plans by March 13 to significantly reduce the federal workforce. However, the memo did not specify the number of employees to be cut.

President Donald Trump let Elon Musk play a key role in his first cabinet meeting Photo: Bloomberg

The memo represents a major escalation in a campaign of massive cuts to government jobs. Until now, the layoffs have focused on probationary workers, who have short stints in their current positions and have few protections.

The next wave will target a much larger group of veteran public employees. At a cabinet meeting, President Donald Trump said Environmental Protection Agency chief Lee Zeldin plans to cut as much as 65 percent of the agency’s more than 15,000 employees.

An Interior Department source said agencies such as the Bureau of Fish and Wildlife and the Bureau of Indian Affairs should prepare for workforce cuts of up to 40%.

About 100,000 of the 2.3 million US federal civilian employees have been laid off or given severance pay.

Donald Trump has shown particular support for Musk by inviting the billionaire to join his cabinet. Some have objected to Musk’s recent demand that all employees be held accountable for their work or face dismissal. Musk is not a cabinet-level official and has not received Senate confirmation.

As cabinet ministers looked on, Mr Musk expressed confidence that he could cut $1 trillion from this year’s $6.7 trillion budget, a hugely ambitious target that would likely cause significant disruption to government programs.

So far, Donald Trump and Musk have failed to slow the pace of government spending. The US government spent 13% more in Donald Trump’s first month in office than it did in the same period last year, largely due to high debt interest payments and rising health care and retirement costs due to an aging population.