Ketamine Chaos Agent: Inside the Explosive White House Cabinet Meeting Over DOGE Layoffs
By E.C. Browne
An extraordinary new piece by The New York Times paints a vivid picture of simmering tensions within President Trump’s administration during his second term. In a Cabinet Room session that included the president, Secretary of State Marco Rubio, and billionaire businessman Elon Musk, the lines between policy discourse and personal dispute blurred significantly.
Rubio, seated beside President Trump, found himself on the receiving end of several pointed critiques by Musk, who seemed intent on highlighting the secretary’s perceived lack of progress in paring down his department’s workforce. Referencing the pivotal argument, The Times reports that Musk told Rubio, “You have fired ‘nobody,’” before sarcastically pointing out that perhaps the only individual Rubio had let go was someone from his Department of Government Efficiency. This jab served as the culmination of frustrations that had evidently been building on both sides.
According to the article, Rubio had been “privately furious” at Musk for weeks, ever since the billionaire’s DOGE team effectively shuttered the United States Agency for International Development. The tension came to a head in that Cabinet Room, where Rubio reminded Musk about the State Department buyouts, telling him, “What about the more than 1,500 State Department officials who took early retirement in buyouts? Didn’t they count as layoffs?” Rubio asked whether Musk wanted him “to rehire all those people just so he could make a show of firing them again,” while laying out his own reorganization plans.
Musk remained unmoved. Dismissing Rubio’s initiatives, he complimented the secretary’s TV presence, saying he was “good on TV,” but insinuating that Rubio was not delivering much else of value. Throughout the tense exchange, President Trump sat observing with his arms folded, stepping in only after the impasse dragged on uncomfortably. The president came to Rubio’s defense, claiming the secretary was doing a “great job” and emphasizing that “he has a lot to deal with,” while urging the pair to cooperate more effectively.
This confrontation was not Musk’s only clash. Before tangling with Rubio, the Transportation Secretary, Sean Duffy, questioned Musk about potential layoffs of air traffic controllers. The exchange culminated in Musk insisting that this assertion was a “lie,” at one point challenging Duffy to “tell me their names” if they were fired, only for Duffy to point out he had prevented those terminations. President Trump ultimately suggested hiring individuals from M.I.T., insisting that air traffic controllers should be “geniuses.”
The article highlights how Musk’s cost-cutting DOGE initiative has ruffled the feathers of nearly every cabinet member. The Veterans Affairs secretary, Doug Collins, voiced concerns about how thousands of veterans could be impacted by the proposed cuts. President Trump was quick to agree that any cuts should be made with a “scalpel” rather than a “hatchet,” hinting that the time might have come for a more calibrated approach.
Beyond those specific exchanges, The Times account underscores the broader anxiety among cabinet secretaries and administration staff. Musk not only wields significant influence through his campaign financing but also possesses a powerful megaphone via his social media platform, X. According to the article, “administration staff members and cabinet secretaries alike” fear becoming targets of public rebuke.
The White House press secretary, Karoline Leavitt, sought to downplay the tension, calling the gathering a “great and productive meeting,” while State Department spokesperson Tammy Bruce framed it as “an open and productive discussion” working toward the goal of making America great again. Musk himself posted later that the meeting was “very productive,” yet inside the Cabinet Room, witnesses said his frustration was apparent.
Whether the new arrangement—putting cabinet secretaries formally in charge of reorganizations and staffing, with Musk’s team acting as advisors—will resolve these fissures remains to be seen. What the story makes clear is that these early months of Trump’s second term have proven to be as tumultuous as any in recent memory, revealing an administration wrestling with ambitious cost-cutting measures, high-level disagreements, and the challenge of balancing a lean federal workforce with maintaining effective governance.
