Joe Lonsdale, a tech investor close to Mr. Musk, is not planning to play a formal role in the Trump transition, according to a person briefed on the matter, and he has said publicly that he does not want to join the administration “full time” but would rather play a part-time advisory role.

Campaign mega-donor Elon Musk and former Republican candidate Vivek Ramaswamy will lead the new department, nicknamed “DOGE.”

Musk and Ramaswamy are coming to the mission ready to cut thousands of government positions and run the government like a business. The press release likened their mission to the Manhattan Project, which developed the atomic bomb.