Elon Musk has directly accused Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer of profiting from government fraud, escalating their ongoing public feud over the Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) and its focus on federal spending fraud.
Recently, Musk has hinted that his DOGE team will be targeting all unusually rich lawmakers, and wants answers on how so many have turned their $174,000 annual salary into multi-million dollar fortunes.
“Chuck, I’m starting to think you’re getting a piece of the action with the government fraud. But no, that couldn’t possibly be the reason, could it?” Musk wrote Tuesday morning on X, responding to Schumer’s post claiming “Trump has unleashed chaos on America.”
The accusation against Schumer comes amid a broader set of claims by Musk about “strangely wealthy” members of Congress. At a recent Wisconsin town hall, Musk described a “giant fraud loophole” involving government funds funneled through non-governmental organizations and hinted that his DOGE team would take a look.
“There is a massive amount of corruption” in federal spending, Musk told the Wisconsin audience. “But it is circuitous, so what happens is there’s money that — obviously it’s your taxpayer money — that is then sent to various government organizations who then send it to NGOs.”
“They’ll send the money overseas to one NGO, then they’ll go through a bunch of them, and then I’m highly confident that a bunch of that money then comes back to the United States and lands in the pockets of the people you just mentioned,” Musk revealed.
While Musk didn’t specifically name Schumer during this explanation, he concluded by saying, “There’s a lot of strangely wealthy members of Congress where I’m trying to connect the dots of, ‘How did they become rich?'”
Elon Musk: “There is a massive amount of corruption… effectively there’s a giant fraud loophole where the government can send money to an NGO that is then no longer the government by the laws of the U.S., let’s just say there are a lot of strangely wealthy members of Congress..” pic.twitter.com/Gy2Q38o5hj
— America (@america) March 31, 2025
Schumer fired back at Musk’s accusations.
“Another Elon lie,” he said. “He wants you to think anyone who dares to stand up to him is committing fraud, meanwhile he’s taking tens of billions from the government.”
The exchange is part of an intense rivalry between the two that began in February when Schumer criticized DOGE as “an un-elected secret group” running “rampant through the executive branch.”
Musk responded by claiming Schumer was angry because DOGE was “dismantling the radical-left shadow government in full view of the public.”
In a separate post, Schumer has targeted Musk’s efforts to shrink waste in Social Security spending.
“What Elon Musk is doing at Social Security is cutting benefits. And Senate Republicans are standing with him. They blocked our amendments last week to protect Social Security from DOGE and reverse the Social Security layoffs and office closures,” Schumer said.
Musk also dismissed this claim, writing, “The intern running Schumer’s social media account is lying.”
The Department of Government Efficiency, established by President Donald Trump to eliminate billions in waste and fraud in federal spending, continues to be a lightning rod for conflict between the administration and Democratic lawmakers desperate to keep up federal spending.