DOGE head Elon Musk is conducting an online poll about whether his 25-year-old aide who resigned after his posts in favor of eugenics should be given another chance.
Musk’s online poll came hours after Marko Elez, the aide who was fighting to gain access to a database with Treasury payments totalling trillions stepped down after his posts calling to ‘normalize’ Indian hate under a pseudonym were revealed. One bragged he was ‘racist before it was cool.’
Musk, whose real and perceived influence has grown to the point that he is pictured on the cover of the latest Time Magazine seated behind the presidential Resolute Desk as if it was his, raised the issue in the form of a question.
‘Bring back @DOGE staffer who made inappropriate statements via a now deleted pseudonym?’ the billionaire SpaceX and Tesla founder asked.
The poll quickly attracted 4 million views on X, showing Musk’s reach on the platform he bought and renamed.
The poll only allows users to respond with a ‘yes’ or ‘no.’
The results were unambiguous. Out of nearly 400,000 responses, those who took part favored the reinstatement of Elez by 78-22.
But Musk gave more clarity on his posture in response to another X user.
S.E. Robinson, who describes himself as an information broker for multiple Musk companies, posted: ‘Big Balls deserves a 2nd chance… Seriously though, have a talk to about the racist stuff. Not cool.’
That comment appeared to reference another member of Musk’s DOGE crew, Edward Coristine, a 19-year old high school graduate who has founded a number of start-up companies, including one called Sexy LLC, that was registered when he was 16.
The most may have conflated the two cases, but elicited a response from Musk.
‘True,’ Musk responded.
Marko Elez’s name only surfaced after a court fight over accessing Treasury’s $5 trillion payment system.
Within hours, the Wall Street Journal had hunted down his posts from a now-deleted account.
Musk currently lists his title on Twitter as ‘White House Tech Support’, a cheeky missive that nonetheless points to the importance of the data his young team is seeking to access.
Musk’s poll, providing a potential ammunition for Elez to be reinstated, comes as DOGE is coming increased scrutiny for gaining access to agency information systems while placing senior government officials on leave as he seeks $1 trillion in savings by slashing staff.
DOGE informed 9,400 USAID employees they will be fired, with plans only to retain 611 deemed essential.
It came as the agency suddenly recalled employees stationed overseas as part of its foreign assistance mission, provoking howls from congressional Democrats that Trump was in effect eliminating an agency authorized and funded by Congress.
Secretary of State Marco Rubio has been named acting head of the agency.
President Trump has long been known to be wary of aides who eclipse him in the spotlight. In the event that the Time cover picture wasn’t helpful, Musk left no doubt online about his admiration for Trump.
‘I love @realDonaldTrump as much as a straight man can love another man,’ he posted.
Elez resigned from his position after his links to racist social media posts promoting eugenics were unearthed.
Marko Elez was one of two employees at the Department of Government Efficiency granted access to $5trillion in the Treasury payment systems following an 11th hour court hearing on Thursday.
But by Thursday afternoon, the 25-year-old trusted Musk ally had resigned after The Wall Street Journal probed his links to the since-deleted social media account.
According to the publication, the X account ‘advocated repealing the Civil Rights Act and backed a ‘eugenic immigration policy’.’
Other posts allegedly read ‘You could not pay me to marry outside of my ethnicity’, and ‘normalize Indian hate.’
Another allegedly read: ‘Just for the record, I was racist before it was cool.’
The account also weighed in on the Israel-Palestine crisis, with a post that read: ‘I would not mind at all if Gaza and Israel were both wiped off the face of the Earth.’
White House spokesperson Karoline Leavitt said that Elez had resigned from his role.
Elez graduated with a computer science degree from Rutgers University and went on to work for Musk’s SpaceX, Starlink, and X, with a focus predominately in AI.
It comes after a last-ditch court request to limit DOGE’s access to Treasury’s $5trillion system – the first hiccup for the nascent agency after weeks of ruthlessly purging federal institutions to eliminate waste and overspending.
Over the coming days and weeks, the court’s decision on privacy concerns about DOGE’s access to the data will be a monumental test of their power to infiltrate and wipe out government spending.
Lawyers with the Justice Department agreed to a motion that allows only two people associated with Musk ‘read-only’ access to the system – including tax returns and social security numbers – on the condition that they do not share what they find with colleagues.
Those two employees are Musk disciples Tom Krause and Elez.
Virginia Congressman Don Beyer described Elez’ resignation as ‘a scandal.’
‘Elon Musk gave a self-described ‘racist’ and eugenicist access to a system that controls all financial payments from the U.S. Treasury,’ he said.
‘That system also contains the personal information including Social Security info of every American.
‘This is why we have a process to vet civil servants, and why we hire and promote them based on merit, not their personal relationship to some rich guy.
‘How dare Elon Musk bully and threaten good people who spent their careers serving the American people when he brings this level of gross incompetence to his work.’
He demanded everyone who was involved in hiring Elez be ‘fired’ and said DOGE ‘should be deleted’ in its entirety.
Musk has faced criticism for his decision to hire a hand-picked team of young, college aged men to help him purge federal agencies and eliminate waste.
This week, six men aged between 19 and 25 were publicly identified as DOGE employees.
At just 19, Edward Coristine is the youngest of the fresh-faced bunch taking on corporate America and longstanding government institutions.
According to WIRED, he’s been dubbed an ‘expert’ in his field, and specifics about his role aren’t yet clear.
Akash Bobba, 21, Ethan Shaotran, 22, and Luke Farritor, 23, along with Coristine, have reportedly been granted A-suite level clearance for their work, meaning they can work out of the agency’s top floor with access to all physical spaces and IT systems.
Musk’s DOGE has been rapidly growing in power and expanding its remit, most recently securing clearance to access to restricted parts of the General Services Administration buildings and IT systems.
The oldest of the bunch is 25-year-old Berkeley graduate Gavin Kliger, who while not identified as having top level clearance has already proven he wields significant power.
Finally, Gautier Cole Killian has been named for his role with DOGE, which is reportedly on a ‘volunteer’ basis at this stage.
After widespread criticism about the men’s youth, Musk released a statement about the appointments.
‘Time to confess: Media reports saying that DOGE has some of world’s best software engineers are in fact true,’ Musk wrote on X.
