It is not that unusual for a president to create a special committee to do X. The difference this time is that Musk is much more vocal and cocksure (or maybe j

It is not that unusual for a president to create a special committee to do X. The difference this time is that Musk is much more vocal and cocksure (or maybe just that he has his own media platform, so we get to see that he is vocal and cocksure). But the problem these special committees always run into is that they have no actual constitutional authority to do anything. They can't pass legislation, they can't codify federal regulations. All they can do is make recommendations. (The president may give those recommendations the force of orders, but the president could have issued those same orders without the committee.) So I don't think this that different from normal. > a new government department with novel scope and power would be created for them to control. But it's not. Despite the name, it's not actually a department - that requires congressional approval. It's just a committee. And the only power it has is issuing recommendations to actual departments. And those recommendations only have the power that Trump gives them - which also is nothing new.