WASHINGTON

US President Donald Trump said Friday that tech billionaire Elon Musk paid a visit to the Pentagon to address costs.

"Elon was over there to address costs, DOGE, a thing called DOGE," Trump told reporters at the White House alongside Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth, referring to the Department of Government Efficiency, Musk’s controversial team tasked with cutting government expenditures.

Trump called Musk, also his top campaign donor, a "great patriot."

The president said Musk is "paying a big price for helping to cut costs," likely referring to public demonstrations and some attacks at Musk’s Tesla car dealerships by opponents of DOGE, attacks fiercely condemned by Trump in recent days.

Hegseth said Musk was welcomed at the Pentagon on Friday to talk about DOGE, efficiency, and innovations, pushing back at a report by New York Times that China would also be discussed, which Trump firmly denied earlier.

"It was a great informal conversation," said Hegseth.

In his remarks, Trump called the Times a "dishonest newspaper" and "garbage".

"They have fake sources, or they don't have sources. I think they make most of it up, but this was a made up story by the New York Times. I call it the failing newspaper. It's failing and they shouldn't do that," said the president.

Last month Trump said Musk was due to audit the Pentagon, which raised questions of conflicts of interest, as his companies have signed billions in contracts with the Defense Department.

Hegseth, Musk discuss innovation, efficiency, smarter production

According to the Pentagon officials, the meeting between Hegseth and Musk was not related to his efforts with the DOGE but was rather the result of a personal invitation by Pentagon chief to visit the department's headquarters.

During a private meeting, which lasted about an hour, defense officials said they discussed innovation, efficiency and smarter production, as they might apply to the Defense Department.

On Thursday, Hegseth announced more than $580 million in cuts to contracts as part of a partnership with the DOGE.

"Total cuts, running a total $800 million in wasteful spending, canceled over the first few weeks as DoD partners with DOGE here to make sure that our war fighters have what they need by cutting the waste, fraud and abuse," he said, adding that the DoD has "a lot more coming" regarding cuts to spending.

The last time Musk visited the Pentagon was in 2016, when he met with then-Defense Secretary Ash Carter.