‘What the f— do you mean per DOGE’: Elon Musk’s DOGE is already contributing to misinformation online

Social media posts about the Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) will likely be spammed with community notes before it becomes an official advisory body under the Trump administration.

A “breaking news” account alleged on Elon Musk’s X that US taxpayers “paid $150.7 billion” in 2023 to support illegal immigrants. The post cited DOGE as its source, which raised eyebrows. There is no proper way to cite DOGE. As of December 2024, DOGE isn’t a real entity or a functioning Elon Musk project yet.

Several social media users were furious at this baseless and misinformed claim. One user wrote, “What the fuck do you mean, “per DOGE.”

Meanwhile, other social media users feared the unprecedented “stampede of misinformation” surrounding the department. While community note members debated and researched the context, many people probably already considered the absurd post to state a fact.

The harm to the reputation of undocumented immigrants can’t be ignored when posts like those are made. It frames migrants as people who undeservingly benefit from the hard work of US citizens. According to the American Immigration Council, in 2022 alone, households led by undocumented migrants paid $75.6 billion in total tax contributions. This is a far cry from the thought that undocumented migrants are abusing the American welfare system.

Social media self-corrects

Thankfully, one X user did the legwork to find the actual source of the figure. A think tank called the Federation for American Immigration Reform (FAIR) estimated that the US spent $150.7 billion on illegal immigration. Nevertheless, the social media user who corrected the claim cautioned others to be critical of the source. FAIR is not a neutral think tank and often circulates anti-immigration rhetoric. FAIR’s board has been linked to white supremacist groups. Its founder, John Tanton, was a white supremacist who believed in maintaining a dominant European-American majority in the United States.

Whether the original poster’s “per DOGE” claim was meant to be satirical or not, it’s worrying that this kind of [mis]information is now spreading so easily on Elon Musk’s X. When DOGE becomes active, how long will it take Musk to stop community notes altogether?