Apple cofounder Steve Wozniak lays into Elon Musk’s ‘mass firings’: ‘I don’t know what got into his head’

The Apple cofounder excoriated Musk during a recent interview, criticizing his management style at the so-called Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE).

“I don’t know what got into his head,” Wozniak told CNBC. 

“Sometimes you get so rich at these big companies, when you’re on top, it goes to your head, and you’re the most credible person in the world, you’re the brightest, and you’re gonna dictate what others will do.

“Bullying is the best way to think of it,” Wozniak said. 

Musk and Tesla did not immediately respond to a request for comment. 

Musk’s role as a purported efficiency expert in charge of slashing billions of dollars from the federal government has garnered criticism from affected employees and legal experts who charge that the Tesla CEO and his team of young cost-cutters don’t understand the programs they are cutting. Reporters say they have found plenty of errors in DOGE’s claims of cost savings, alleging inflated numbers and contracts that ended months ago being claimed for savings. The federal government has also had to reverse multiple firings, calling back CDC employees who monitor outbreaks, FDA staffers working on medical devices, and the workers who design and maintain the U.S.’s cache of nuclear weapons at the National Nuclear Safety Administration.

“These mass firings—not good for a business to run that way,” Wozniak said. 

The playbook mirrors Musk’s takeover of X, formerly Twitter, which saw mass layoffs of a majority of the company followed by a handful of rehirings of critical staff.

While Wozniak said he “definitely” agrees that inefficiencies in government should be eliminated, “it should be done, I guess, more surgically, with a scalpel instead of a sledgehammer,” he said. 

Wozniak added he would reserve final judgment on DOGE’s actions. 

“I still think, let’s wait till it’s done, there might be some good that comes out of it that we can agree on,” he said.