'The Daily Show' gets real about Elon Musk's White House takeover

Where does host Desi Lydic start?
By Shannon Connellan  on 
Desi Lydic speaking
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Like Stephen Colbert on The Late Show, The Daily Show's Desi Lydic unpacked the current aggressive White House takeover of Donald Trump's "special government employee" Elon Musk.

The tech billionaire and his team have been infiltrating U.S. federal government departments including reportedly accessing the computer systems of the Office of Personnel Management (OPM), the federal government's HR department.

"Now you might be thinking, 'I don’t want white nationalist Tony Stark to have sole control of the inner workings of the federal government.' But relax, it's not just Elon. He has a fully equipped team," said Lydic, pointing to the fact that Musk's newly-created Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) is reportedly staffed mainly by college grads — including a former Neuralink intern whose online tag was "bigballs".

"Great, bigballs has my social security number, now I feel better!" Lydic said. "I know we complained about our leaders being too old but doesn’t this go a little too far in the other direction? Surely there must be a middle ground somewhere between crypto bros and crypt keepers."

A black and white image of a person with a long braid and thick framed glasses.
Shannon Connellan

Shannon Connellan is Mashable's UK Editor based in London, formerly Mashable's Australia Editor, but emotionally, she lives in the Creel House. A Tomatometer-approved critic, Shannon writes about everything (but not anything) across entertainment, tech, social good, science, and culture.


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