Politics
Trump’s Pick To Lead Government Spending Cuts At ‘DOGE’ Wants DEA Expanded Despite Supporting Marijuana Legalization
A non-governmental advisory body that President-elect Donald Trump is putting together will have two familiar names helming the ship: Elon Musk and Vivek Ramaswamy. And while both are proponents of marijuana and psychedelics reform, giving hope to some reformers that the new entity will recommend scaling back the war on drugs, Ramaswamy has previously insisted on expanding the Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA).
Musk, the CEO of Telsa and SpaceX, and Ramaswamy, a former 2024 Republican presidential candidate, were named to lead the yet-to-be-established Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE), which will focus on cutting spending and reducing the federal workforce.
While there are still questions about the exact functioning and authority of DOGE—an acronym that nods at a cryptocurrency Musk helped popularize—its leadership has made clear they intend to push for sweeping changes. The incoming administration’s proposed “drastic reduction in federal regulations provides sound industrial logic for mass head-count reductions across the federal bureaucracy,” they said in a Wall Street Journal op-ed published last week.
“DOGE intends to work with embedded appointees in agencies to identify the minimum number of employees required at an agency for it to perform its constitutionally permissible and statutorily mandated functions. The number of federal employees to cut should be at least proportionate to the number of federal regulations that are nullified: Not only are fewer employees required to enforce fewer regulations, but the agency would produce fewer regulations once its scope of authority is properly limited.”
Ramaswamy talked about his vision for slashing the federal workforce while he was campaigning for the GOP nomination. But he took drug policy reform advocates by surprise when he outlined that plan, which included massive cuts to agencies like the FBI but a significant expansion of DEA, despite his criticism of the broader drug war.
With nearly 10,000 employees, DEA’s individual budget for 2021 was $3.3 billion. The Government Accountability Office (GAO) also released a report showing that “the federal drug control budget for fiscal year 2022 was $39 billion.” All told, the country has spent over a trillion dollars on enforcement since President Richard Nixon declared a war on drugs in 1971.
Ramaswamy said last year that it’s important to provide an infusion of labor because DEA is “taking on the drug enforcement problems that we have in this country.” But without action to end federal prohibition of marijuana and psychedelics first, the plan could mean increased enforcement of the very laws that he’s separately said he wants to change.
Legal experts have already challenged the idea that a president holds such unilateral authority to eliminate vast swaths of the government—and, in an advisory role outside of the executive branch, DOGE’s recommendations presumably would not be binding. But Ramaswamy’s perspective could nonetheless come into play once the body becomes operational.
“The entrenched and ever-growing bureaucracy represents an existential threat to our republic, and politicians have abetted it for too long. That’s why we’re doing things differently,” Musk and Rarmaswamy said in their op-ed. “We are entrepreneurs, not politicians. We will serve as outside volunteers, not federal officials or employees. Unlike government commissions or advisory committees, we won’t just write reports or cut ribbons. We’ll cut costs.”
Where Musk stands on DEA’s relevance is less certain. But he did once find himself facing potential penalties due to another agency’s drug policies.
In 2018, the entrepreneur publicly puffed on a marijuana blunt (which he later claimed he never actually inhaled), prompting an investigation by NASA over his aerospace company’s “workplace safety” and “adherence to a drug-free environment.”
Also that year, after Musk said he was considering taking Tesla private at a share price of $420 in an apparent nod to the cannabis holiday, the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) warned that the statement was “false and misleading” and made without required notification to regulators.
— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) November 13, 2024
But ultimately, the two DOGE executives are generally aligned in their support for drug policy reform. That includes their mutual embrace of psychedelics as an alternative treatment option for certain mental health conditions. And neither has been shy about their support for decriminalizing marijuana.
Despite the remaining uncertainties about how DOGE will influence the structure of the federal government, advocates are paying close attention to where all of Trump’s nominees stand on drug policy.
Here’s a look at the records of Musk and Ramaswamy:
Elon Musk
While Musk caused a stir over (not) inhaling a marijuana blunt in 2018—and also voiced support for legal access to psychedelics—he also reportedly contributed half of a million dollars to a political committee supporting Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis (R) that later opposed a state marijuana legalization ballot initiative that ultimately failed this month.
Also, during an interview with podcaster Joe Rogan in 2021, Musk said he thinks CBD is “fake,” arguing that claims about the effects of the non-intoxicating cannabinoid are overhyped and that it “doesn’t do anything.”
Musk might not be a believer in CBD, but he does enjoy playing into marijuana culture from time to time.
When shares of Telsa hit $420, for example, he responded on Twitter with crying laughing emojis and said “Whoa … the stock is so high lol.”
In 2021, Musk also predicted that, as younger generations assume positions of power in government, there will be a greater societal embrace of the therapeutic potential of psychedelics. He’s also personally disclosed using ketamine for depression treatment.
“I think, generally, people should be open to psychedelics,” he said. “A lot of people making laws are kind of from a different era, so I think, as the new generation gets into political power, I think we will see greater receptivity to the benefits of psychedelics.”
As recently as last week, Musk also briefly noted his support for access to psychedelics such as ibogaine and MDMA, responding to an X post expressing hope that the “new administration will embrace the healing potential of these medicines to help end the veteran suicide crisis.”
It would make a difference to many people
— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) November 19, 2024
Vivek Ramaswamy
During his unsuccessful bid for the 2024 GOP presidential nomination, Ramaswamy’s campaign said he would federally legalize marijuana and provide psychedelics access for military veterans with post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) if elected.
The former pharmaceutical industry executive previously discussed the need to decriminalize cannabis, acknowledging that while it’s “not a popular position in the Republican party,” it’s important for him to “speak the truth.”
Yet despite this policy position, Ramaswamy took advocates by surprise when he disclosed that he personally voted against a successful marijuana legalization initiative in his home state of Ohio during the November 2023 election.
He said that the reform represented an “abandonment of the rule of law” given federal prohibition and that he doesn’t support revenue funding equity programs.
Ramaswamy has separately embraced psychedelics access and, at one point, suggesting that there should be broader drug decriminalization at some point, describing it as an “important” piece of a more comprehensive drug policy.
“I support decriminalizing ayahuasca & ketamine for veterans suffering from PTSD, to prevent the epidemic of fentanyl & suicide,” he said in a tweet that came in response to a Fox News article that the candidate criticized because of how it framed his overall decriminalization stance. He called the article “more planted trash.”
In an interview last year, Ramaswamy repeatedly described decriminalization as an “important” piece of a more comprehensive drug policy, emphasizing his view that tighter border security and reduced U.S. demand for drugs are also essential.
Ramaswamy said at the event that he’s skeptical of prohibition and is “not a war-on-drugs person.”
He also stressed the availability of psychedelics as a viable alternative for people who are suffering from mental health conditions.
“I’m probably the only person in the modern history of our party that is open to a conversation about, for veterans at least. Let’s start with PTSD, where there’s good evidence for psychedelics, from ayahuasca to ketamine,” Ramaswamy said. “You could actually have an open discussion about rationally giving people off ramps.”
“I personally know parents whose kids have died, who believe—and I think on good authority—that their kids could have at least survived by having an alternative path,” he said.
He called for psychedelics descheduling as part of the plan that’s meant to take a “holistic approach” the high rates of substance misuse and suicide within the veteran population.
At a campaign event in Iowa last year, the then-candidate spoke with an attendee who voiced support for the therapeutic use of certain psychedelics. Ramaswamy said that he agreed there’s a need to make plant-based medicines available, though he wants to start with veterans suffering from PTSD.
“What was whacky yesterday is true today. That’s what history teaches us,” he said.
Beyond his proposal to beef up DEA, Ramaswamy supports an extreme and militarized approach to the fentanyl overdose crisis, sending U.S. troops to the Southern border to “annihilate” Mexican cartels in a “shock-and-awe” campaign.
“I will deploy the U.S. military to protect our *own* border instead of someone else’s. And I will annihilate the Mexican drug cartels: that’s how you end the fentanyl crisis which kills 50x the number of Americans each year vs. the number who died on 9/11,” he said last year. “I refuse to be a passive buffoon who sits in the White House simply watching it happen: we’re going to finally solve this problem.”
During an interview on “Club Random with Bill Maher” last year, Ramaswamy previewed his plan to slash the federal workforce—especially FBI—and build up DEA, which he described as “far more effective on the frontlines of the fentanyl epidemic.” The proposal drew a skeptical reaction from Maher, who has also long decried the failures of the drug war.
“If you’re gonna get rid of an agency why don’t you get rid of that one? The DEA,” Maher said.
“We have laws in this country,” Ramaswamy replied. “So you could debate whether you like the laws or not, but I’m saying, as long as you have the laws, we’re talking about effectiveness here. And my point is the FBI is broken.”
In that same interview, the candidate reiterated his support for federal marijuana legalization, saying the current state-federal conflict on cannabis is “a farce” that allows governments to unfairly target people.
“I think we should align the federal law with the state law,” he said.
But that support for the policy reform is also coupled with a seemingly stigmatizing view about the use of cannabis, as the candidate said in May 2023 that he wants to see increased work requirements for federal social benefits, stating that the government should stop “paying people to stay home, binge TV, smoke pot, & be depressed.”
The big picture
As Trump’s cabinet takes form, nominees have been mixed as far as their positions on cannabis are concerned.
For example, to the disappointment of certain advocates, pro-legalization former Rep. Matt Gaetz (R-FL) withdrew as the pick for U.S. attorney general—and the president-elect has since selected a former Florida attorney general, Pam Bondi, who opposed efforts to legalize medical marijuana in the state.
Trump also recently selected physician and TV personality Dr. Mehmet Oz to oversee the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS), adding a pro-medical-marijuana voice to the forthcoming administration.
The president-elect announced his intent to nominate former Rep. Doug Collins (R-GA) to head up the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs (VA)—a choice that raises questions about how the agency might navigate marijuana issues given his prior record of voting against medical cannabis access for military veterans during his time in Congress.
Trump has also named Robert F. Kennedy Jr. as his pick to lead the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS), where he will have the chance to advance major drug policy reforms he’s championed such as promoting access to psychedelics therapy and reshaping federal marijuana laws.
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