Musk acted – Maggie Haberman, speaking with Jonathan Swan on “Morning Joe,” said Elon Musk functioned like a “co-president” for the first four months of President Donald Trump’s second term, arguing the White House never fully stabilized after his brief role heading the De
For the first four months of President Donald Trump’s second term, one New York Times journalist says the White House effectively ran as if it had a second chief executive — not Donald Trump, but Elon Musk.
Maggie Haberman said that when Musk was installed at the center of the government through his role leading the so-called Department of Government Efficiency. the administration “never quite recovered.” She described Musk’s influence as something more destabilizing than normal advisory access. telling “Morning Joe” on Friday that Musk was “essentially serving not as a co-president but as a co-president for parts of the first four months or so.”.
Haberman’s claim came during a discussion with Jonathan Swan about details from their new book. “Regime Change. ” and their broader depiction of how chaotic the White House has been during Trump’s second term. In that conversation, Haberman tied much of the dysfunction to Musk’s short-lived dominance inside the West Wing.
As Swan described Musk’s place in that same swirl of power. he also recounted Musk’s delight in watching his tech rivals behave differently around Trump. Swan said Musk took pleasure in seeing Jeff Bezos and Mark Zuckerberg “sucking up” to the president. describing how Trump showed Musk texts sent by both Bezos and Zuckerberg.
Swan said Trump displayed those messages to Musk on the cellphone Musk was carrying, and that Musk replied: “First-class groveling.”
The book discussion also turned to what Musk’s tenure as head of DOGE allegedly produced inside the federal workforce and research system. Haberman acknowledged that Musk did what she called “a good amount of damage. ” pointing to a list of effects during Musk’s time heading the department: firing “hundreds of thousands” of federal workers and cutting funding for medical research. school lunch initiatives. and staffing at national parks and forests. along with “a litany of other programs.”.
Swan’s account made clear that even beyond policy and staffing, the journalists said the relationships themselves became part of the story. Musk’s sway, Haberman indicated, began to shift as his access started to fade in April 2025.
The discussion then landed on a specific dinner moment that left at least one host visibly shaken. Swan described Zuckerberg being at Trump’s Florida country club Mar-a-Lago for dinner. where the president decided to play “The Star-Spangled Banner” from his iPad. Swan said it wasn’t the regular version — it was “the version recorded by the J6 Prison Choir, OK?”.
Swan added that Zuckerberg stood up with a hand on his chest and appeared not to know what the audio was, while the broadcast came from people imprisoned for their role in the Jan. 6 riot.
On set, “Morning Joe” co-host Mika Brzezinski reacted with particular disgust. She said she was “still stuck on the grotesque scene of the J6 choir music playing, hand on hearts,” after the Zuckerberg anecdote was aired several minutes later.
Haberman did not offer more detail on what she meant by Musk’s four-month role beyond her claim that the administration failed to stabilize after his influence — but her phrasing made the stakes of the internal power struggle unmistakable. In her telling. the damage wasn’t just what DOGE did; it was how the White House absorbed Musk’s presence and struggled to regain its footing afterward.
For readers tracking Trump’s second term. the common thread in Haberman and Swan’s discussion is that the revolving door of relationships — and the shifting balance of influence among major tech figures — is not presented as background color. It’s described as an engine of instability. with April 2025 marked as the point when Musk’s dominance began to fizzle out. after his time in the role that Haberman said left the government “never quite recovered.”.
Maggie Haberman Jonathan Swan Morning Joe Elon Musk Department of Government Efficiency DOGE Donald Trump second term Regime Change Mar-a-Lago Jeff Bezos Mark Zuckerberg J6 Prison Choir federal workers medical research school lunch initiatives national parks and forests