announced that he would rehire Marko Elez, a former Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) employee, who had been previously fired for posting racist comments. The decision came after Elez resigned on February 6, following revelations of the offensive posts, which were uncovered by The Wall Street Journal.

The DOGE staffer has been identified as Marko Elez, and earlier in the day he had controversially been given approval by a federal judge to access the U.S. Treasury’s payments database, along with a second employee working for Musk (pictured). While the judge did give him access, he restricted his ability to share data held within the system.