Speaking on Cruz’s podcast, Musk revealed that 14 such systems exist within the U.S. Treasury and other agencies, transferring large sums without the necessary evidence to justify the payments. Musk claimed that in departments housing one of these systems, reported spending could be off by as much as 5 percent of the budget when presented to Congress, while Cruz suggested that these improper payments could potentially total “trillions” of dollars.
“They’re mostly at Treasury,” Musk said about the computers discovered by his U.S. Department of Government Efficiency, or DOGE, “but there’s some at [Health and Human Services], there’s one or two at State, there’s some at [the Department of Defense].”
“I think we’ve found now 14 magic money computers. They just send money out of nothing,” he told the Texas Republican senator.
Expounding on DOGE’s discovery, the unconventional entrepreneur explained that the presence of these computers prevents the Treasury Dept. from fully informing lawmakers about the federal government’s total spending.
“You may think that government computers all talk to each other, they all synchronize, they add up what funds are going somewhere and its coherent and that the numbers you’re presented as a senator are actually the real numbers. They’re not,” he said.
“How does it work?” Cruz asked.
Musk responded: “It just issues payments!”
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