US President-elect Donald Trump has named Elon Musk and Vivek Ramaswamy to lead a panel aiming to reduce federal workforce and regulations. They plan to cut $500 billion in US spending by eliminating unauthorized expenditures and rescinding unnecessary regulations.
Recent US Supreme Court rulings have empowered the panel, which believes they can use these decisions to strip power from federal agencies and eliminate costly and inefficient regulations. Musk and Ramaswamy claim that thousands of existing federal rules are invalid and will work to enact significant structural downsizing within the federal government.
However, experts warn that Trump’s ability to implement sweeping deregulation is limited due to existing laws and obstacles such as lawsuits brought by private citizens. William Buzbee, a professor at Georgetown Law, has expressed skepticism over Musk and Ramaswamy’s interpretation of the Supreme Court cases, stating that their claims are “very confused.”
The panel plans to issue individual reports on its work and submit a comprehensive report in July 2026. With an electoral mandate and a conservative-majority Supreme Court, Trump sees this as an opportunity to enact substantial changes within the federal government.
Source: https://www.reuters.com/world/us/musk-ramaswamy-plan-lean-supreme-court-rulings-reduce-federal-agencies-reach-2024-11-20