Meet the young team of software engineers slashing government waste at DOGE: report
2025-02-05
Category: political

Tesla and Space X CEO Elon Musk’s DOGE efforts to slash government waste and streamline the federal bureaucracy include the hiring of several up-and-coming young software engineers tasked with&nbsp;"modernizing federal technology and software to maximize governmental efficiency and productivity."&nbsp; Six young men between the ages of 19 and 24 — Akash Bobba, Edward Coristine, Luke Farritor, Gautier Cole Killian, Gavin Kliger and Ethan Shaotran — have taken up various roles furthering the DOGE agenda, according to a&nbsp;report from Wired. Bobba was part of the highly regarded Management, Entrepreneurship, and Technology program at UC Berkeley and has held internships at the Bridgewater Associates hedge fund, Meta and Palantir. "Let me tell you something about Akash," Grata AI CEO Charis Zhang posted on X about Bobba in recent days. "During a project at Berkeley, I accidentally deleted our entire codebase 2 days before the deadline. I panicked. Akash just stared at the screen, shrugged, and rewrote everything from scratch in one night — better than before. We submitted early and got first in the class. Many such stories. I trust him with everything I own." 'VIPER'S NEST': USAID ACCUSED OF CORRUPTION, MISMANAGEMENT LONG BEFORE TRUMP ADMIN TOOK AIM  Coristine, a recent high school graduate who studied mechanical engineering and physics at Northwestern, previously worked for Musk’s Neuralink project, Wired reported. Bobba and Costine reportedly work directly under Anna Scales as "experts" at the United States Office of Personnel Management (OPM).&nbsp; Kliger is listed on LinkedIn as a special advisor to the director of OPM and attended UC Berkeley in 2020. Kliger has also worked at the AI company Databricks.&nbsp;Kliger’s substack contains a post, "The Curious Case of Matt Gaetz: How the Deep State Destroys Its Enemies," as well as another titled "Pete Hegseth as Secretary of Defense: The Warrior Washington Fears." USAID CLOSES HQ TO STAFFERS MONDAY AS MUSK SAYS TRUMP SUPPORTS SHUTTING AGENCY DOWN Another post on the substack is headlined, "Why I gave up a seven-figure salary to save America." Killian is listed as a volunteer for DOGE who attended McGill University after graduating from high school in 2019. Wired reported that Killian previously worked as an engineer at a company called Jump Trading that deals with high-frequency financial trades and algorithms. Shaotran was studying computer science at Harvard University last year and is the founder of Energize AI, an OpenAI-backed startup. Additionally, Shaotran participated in a "hackathon" sponsored by an Elon Musk company where he finished in second place.&nbsp; Farritor, who dropped out of the University of Nebraska-Lincoln, has a working GSA email address, was previously an intern for SpaceX and is also a Thiel fellow.&nbsp;  In 2023, at 21years old, Farritor became the first person to successfully decode text inside a 2,000-year-old Greek scroll using AI, according to the University of Nebraska website. According to Wired, Bobba, Coristine, Farritor and Shaotran have working GSA emails along with A-suite level clearance that allows them to work on the top floor at GSA with access to all IT systems.&nbsp; Fox News Digital reached out to OPM and GSA for comment.&nbsp; Speaking to Fox News' Peter Doocy in the Oval Office Tuesday, President Donald Trump praised the intelligence of some of the young hires working for DOGE. "That's good," Trump said of the hires as young as 19. "They're very smart, though, Peter. They're like you. They're very smart people. "No, I haven't seen them," Trump said when asked if he had met the team. "They work, actually, out of the White House as smart people, unlike what they do in the control towers. We need smart people. We should use some of them in the control towers, where we were putting people that were actually intellectually deficient. That was one of the qualifications is you could be intellectually deficient. "No. We need smart people. Some are young and some are not young. Some are not young at all. But they found great things. Look at the list of things. I'll … maybe I'll do it tomorrow. I'll read off a list of 15 or 20 things that they found inside of the USAID. It has to be corrupt."  Elon Musk has also publicly posted online about the qualifications he is looking for and the strength of his team.&nbsp; "If you’re a hardcore software engineer and want to build the everything app, please join us by sending your best work to code@x.com," Musk posted on X in January. "We don’t care where you went to school or even whether you went to school or what "big name" company you worked at. Just show us your code." In another&nbsp;X post this week, Musk wrote, "Time to confess: Media reports saying that @DOGE has some of world’s best software engineers are in fact true." Wired cited sources who raised concerns about Musk’s team’s clearance, and Democrats in Congress have been railing against DOGE in recent days, arguing that DOGE has&nbsp;received improper access to various government systems.&nbsp; Musk has pushed back on the criticism from Democrats, including allegations about DOGE’s involvement in treasury payment oversight.&nbsp;  "The @DOGE team discovered, among other things, that payment approval officers at Treasury were instructed always to approve payments, even to known fraudulent or terrorist groups. They literally never denied a payment in their entire career. Not even once," Musk, the chair of DOGE, posted early Saturday morning to X.&nbsp; Musk also responded to Democratic critics, including those upset about his efforts to push reforms at USAID, saying the "hysterical reactions" demonstrate the importance of DOGE's work. "An unelected shadow government is conducting a hostile takeover of the federal government," a post on Democratic New York Sen. Chuck Schumer's X account states, echoing remarks the lawmaker made during a press conference.&nbsp; "DOGE is not a real government agency. DOGE has no authority to make spending decisions. DOGE has no authority to shut programs down or to ignore federal law. DOGE’s conduct cannot be allowed to&nbsp;stand. Congress must take action to restore the rule of law."  Musk described the effort to slash government waste and bureaucracy as a one-time opportunity. "Hysterical reactions like this is how you know that @DOGE is doing work that really matters," he wrote in response to Schumer.&nbsp; "This is the one shot the American people have to defeat BUREAUcracy, rule of the bureaucrats, and restore DEMOcracy, rule of the people. We’re never going to get another chance like this. It’s now or never. Your support is crucial to the success of the revolution of the people." Since its creation last month, DOGE's X account has provided updates on its work to cut government spending, including an announcement last week that it had cut more than $1 billion from federal spending through now-defunct diversity, equity and inclusion initiatives and personnel.&nbsp; CLICK HERE TO GET THE FOX NEWS APP "DOGE is fulfilling President Trump’s commitment to making government more accountable, efficient and, most importantly, restoring proper stewardship of the American taxpayer’s hard-earned dollars," a White House spokesperson told Fox News Digital.&nbsp; "Those leading this mission with Elon Musk are doing so in full compliance with federal law, appropriate security clearances and as employees of the relevant agencies, not as outside advisors or entities. The ongoing operations of DOGE may be seen as disruptive by those entrenched in the federal bureaucracy, who resist change. While change can be uncomfortable, it is necessary and aligns with the mandate supported by more than 77 million American voters." Fox News Digital’s Emma Colton and Alex Nitzberg contributed to this report