Trump selects Elon Musk to lead government efficiency department

Donald Trump has revealed Elon Musk and former Republican presidential candidate Vivek Ramaswamy will join his cabinet by leading the Department of Government Efficiency.

Musk and Ramaswamy “will pave the way for my Administration to dismantle Government Bureaucracy, slash excess regulations, cut wasteful expenditures, and restructure Federal Agencies,” Trump said in a statement.

Earlier, Trump announced he is nominating Fox News host and Army veteran Pete Hegseth to serve as his defense secretary as the president-elect made another flurry of key appointments to his team.

He also said he had chosen former Director of National Intelligence John Ratcliffe to lead the CIA, and former Arkansas Governor Mike Huckabee as ambassador to Israel.

Trump’s longtime friend Steven Witkoff has been named as a special envoy to the Middle East, while Bill McGinley, Trump’s Cabinet secretary in his first administration, has been nominated as his White House counsel.

Hegseth, 44, is a co-host of Fox News Channel’s “Fox & Friends Weekend” and has been a contributor with the network since 2014, where he developed a friendship with Trump, who made regular appearances on the show.

He is also the author of “The War on Warriors: Behind the Betrayal of the Men Who Keep Us Free.”

Hegseth was an infantry captain in the Army National Guard and served overseas in Afghanistan, Iraq and Guantanamo Bay, Cuba. He was formerly head of the Concerned Veterans for America, a group backed by conservative billionaires Charles and David Koch, and he unsuccessfully ran for the Senate in Minnesota in 2012.

“With Pete at the helm, America’s enemies are on notice — Our Military will be Great Again, and America will Never Back Down,” Trump said in a statement. “Nobody fights harder for the Troops, and Pete will be a courageous and patriotic champion of our ‘Peace through Strength’ policy.”