Steve Davis, who served as Elon Musk’s de facto second-in-command at the Department of Government Efficiency, is following the billionaire adviser out of President Donald Trump’s signature cost-cutting effort, a person familiar with the move said Thursday.
Like Musk, Davis was serving as a special government employee, a designation that allowed him to keep his job as CEO of one of the billionaire entrepreneur’s companies, the Boring Co., even as he worked on the DOGE effort. SGEs are limited to 130 days of work for the government in any year.
Davis’s move was detailed on condition of anonymity to discuss personnel moves not yet made public.
The Boring Co. is a tunnel construction and equipment company. Davis has also worked at other Musk enterprises, including SpaceX and Twitter, which Musk rebranded as X.
Davis’s departure leaves the future of the effort to scale back US government spending up to lower-profile officials at the White House and federal agencies. Anthony Armstrong, who helped Musk buy Twitter as a banker at Morgan Stanley, and Antonio Gracias, a Musk confidant and CEO of Valor Equity Partners, are also top Musk lieutenants at DOGE.
Trump created the White House unit of experts from computer engineering and finance in January as Musk sought to find $2 trillion in savings. The effort was expected to last through July 4, 2026.
But after shuttering agencies and canceling contracts early in Trump’s second term, the effort to find savings sputtered after allegations of widespread fraud never materialized.
Musk said Wednesday that his time as a formal adviser to Trump is coming to a close. His high-profile political work for the president had spurred worries among investors about the fallout for his companies, most prominently Tesla Inc.