It was never going to be a quiet marriage. When Donald Trump brought Elon Musk into the fold to spearhead the Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE), everyone knew the "move fast and break things" Silicon Valley energy was going to slam headfirst into the "move slow and document everything" reality of the federal bureaucracy. But by early 2026, the vibe in Washington shifted. People started talking about Trump de-muskification and how the General Services Administration (GSA) became the quiet center of a massive rollback.
Honestly, the GSA is usually the most boring agency in the government. They manage office buildings and buy printer paper. Yet, they ended up being the "clean-up crew" after the initial DOGE whirlwind.
The GSA as the Shock Absorber
In the early days of 2025, Musk’s DOGE teams were basically camping out on the sixth floor of the GSA headquarters. There were actual reports of Ikea beds being moved into conference rooms. The goal back then was radical: Musk wanted to slash the federal footprint by shutting down 2 million square feet of office space and canceling over 800 leases.
But here is the thing: you can't just stop paying rent on a federal building without a massive legal headache. By the time we hit 2026, the GSA had to step in to basically "de-muskify" the process. They realized that a lot of those lease cancellations were done without telling the actual tenants—the people working at the Bureau of Indian Affairs or the USGS.
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The GSA started a "triage mode" to walk back the most chaotic cuts. Out of the 800+ lease termination notices sent out during the height of the DOGE era, more than 480 have since been spared. It turns out that shuttering an office in a rural town doesn't just "save money"—it kills the local economy and leaves the government with a breach-of-contract lawsuit.
Why the "De-Muskification" Started
The term "de-muskification" sounds like a weird sci-fi movie, but it's basically the government's way of saying "we need to actually function again." There were a few big reasons why the Trump administration started pulling back on Elon’s influence at the GSA:
- The Big Beautiful Bill Clash: Trump and Musk reportedly clashed over the passage of the "Big Beautiful Bill" in mid-2025. This was a turning point.
- The 1-for-4 Rule: DOGE had implemented a rule where agencies could only hire one person for every four who left. This sounds great for a spreadsheet, but for the GSA—which manages the actual physical infrastructure of the country—it led to a total breakdown in facility management.
- The "Wall of Receipts" Shrinkage: Musk’s team claimed they would save $460 million just from lease cancellations. By July 2025, that estimate was quietly revised down to $140 million. When the savings didn't match the hype, the political cover for the chaos started to vanish.
The Rehiring Phase
Maybe the most surprising part of this whole saga is the "Return to Work" request. After thousands of GSA employees were pushed out or "purged" in early 2025, the administration realized they had cut too deep.
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By late 2025 and early 2026, the GSA was actually sending notices to former employees asking them to come back. You've got to imagine how awkward those emails were. "Hey, remember when we gave you that 'Fork in the Road' email and told you to quit? Well, we actually need someone who knows how the procurement software works."
It wasn't just the GSA, either. The IRS and the Social Security Administration went through similar cycles of firing and then frantic rehiring. The Brookings Institution actually tracked over 26,000 instances where the administration fired someone and then hired them back shortly after.
Centralization vs. Chaos
The real legacy of this period isn't just about Elon leaving Washington in May 2025. It’s about a massive Executive Order titled "Eliminating Waste and Saving Taxpayer Dollars by Consolidating Procurement."
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This order shifted the power. Instead of every agency buying their own laptops or hiring their own security, the GSA became the "Executive Agent." They are now the gatekeeper for all IT and common goods. It was a move to centralize power—sorta taking the "entrepreneurial" advice of DOGE but putting it back into the hands of career civil servants who know the Federal Acquisition Regulation (FAR) inside and out.
What the GSA is focusing on now:
- IT Consolidation: Killing off duplicative contracts across the DoD and VA.
- Portfolio Rationalization: Selling off buildings that are actually empty, rather than just guessing.
- Modernizing the USDS: The U.S. Digital Service (which was briefly renamed the U.S. DOGE Service) is being folded back into a more traditional tech-support role.
Actionable Insights for Federal Contractors and Employees
If you're looking at the landscape in 2026, the "Wild West" era of DOGE is mostly over, replaced by a much more centralized GSA.
- For Contractors: Forget trying to pitch "disruptive" tech to individual agencies. Everything is moving through GSA’s Category Management. If you aren't on a GSA Schedule or a GWAC (Government-Wide Acquisition Contract), you're basically invisible.
- For Federal Workers: The "de-muskification" means more stability, but the hiring freeze (the 1-for-4 rule) is still technically on the books in many places. The focus has shifted from "cutting people" to "centralizing tasks."
- Watch the July 4, 2026 Deadline: This is the official "self-deletion" date for DOGE. Expect a final flurry of activity and "victory laps" before the remaining functions are fully absorbed back into the GSA and OMB.
The takeaway? You can't run a $6 trillion government like a startup for very long. The GSA’s "de-muskification" wasn't necessarily a rejection of efficiency, but a realization that in Washington, the "boring" way of doing things is usually the only way that doesn't end in a lawsuit.