Elon Musk has told multiple people that he has been sleeping at the Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) headquarters in Washington, DC, WIRED has learned, as he works to exercise control over the federal government. DOGE is based out of the Eisenhower Executive Office Building, just steps from the White House.
At an exclusive black-tie dinner hosted by the Alfalfa Club last week, Musk told associates that he’d even been invited to spend the night in the White House itself in the Lincoln Bedroom.
The news shows how deeply Musk has embedded himself in President Donald Trump’s orbit—and how closely he’s following his tried and true playbook from Tesla and Twitter (now X).
During busy periods at Tesla, Musk was known for sleeping on the factory floor. “It was my primary residence,” he claimed during an interview with Ron Baron in 2022. He said the move was strategic, as he wanted employees to see him. “This is important because if the team thinks their leader is off somewhere having a good time, drinking Mai Tais on a tropical island, which I definitely could have been doing…since the team could see me sleeping on the floor during shift change, they knew I was there, and that made a huge difference, they gave it their all.”
The vision of a leader drinking cocktails on a tropical island resurfaced after Musk became Twitter’s biggest shareholder in the spring of 2022. In text messages to his friend, the podcaster and angel investor Jason Calacanis, Musk said Twitter’s newly appointed CEO Parag Agrawal was on a 10-day vacation in Hawaii. At the time, Musk had been toying with the idea of joining Twitter’s board of directors, but was growing increasingly frustrated with Agrawal. He doubted the two could work together.
“Btw, Parag is still on a ten day vacation in Hawaii,” Musk told Calacanis. “No reason to cut it short… in your first tour as ceo (!!!),” Calcanis responded, presumably with a hint of sarcasm. “Shouldn’t he be in a war room right now?!?” Musk then said: “Does doing occasional zoom calls while drinking fruity cocktails at the Four Seasons count?” (The messages were later revealed as part of the discovery process in a lawsuit between Musk and Twitter).
Ultimately, Musk decided he could not save Twitter with Agrawal at the helm, and he bought the company instead.
After the acquisition was complete, Musk began sleeping at the Twitter offices in San Francisco. Employees saw him pacing the floor late at night and being escorted to the bathroom by his security guards. He even tried to get a bathroom installed next to his office so he wouldn’t have to trek across the floor during his stays.
Musk’s lieutenant Steve Davis, CEO of the Boring Company, who has reportedly been recruiting staff to work at DOGE, also temporarily moved into Twitter HQ with his wife and newborn baby.
Earlier this week, the US Office of Personnel Management, which is already stacked with Musk lackeys, sent an email to federal workers titled “a fork in the road.”
“The federal workforce should be comprised of employees who are reliable, loyal, trustworthy, and who strive for excellence in their daily work,” the email read. It directed employees to return to the office five days a week, and commit to a culture of excellence, or effectively resign and continue receiving benefits and pay through September.
The memo closely echoed a note Musk sent to Twitter staff shortly after buying the company. In that note, sent November 16, 2022, Musk told staffers they’d need to commit to working long, intense hours to realize his new vision for the company—otherwise they should resign. “Going forward, to build a breakthrough Twitter 2.0 and succeed in an increasingly competitive world, we will need to be extremely hardcore,” he wrote. “This will mean working long hours at high intensity. Only exceptional performance will constitute a passing grade.”
