• Elizabeth Warren wants President-elect Trump to set conflict-of-interest rules for Elon Musk.
• Warren called any lack of rules an "invitation for corruption on a scale not seen in our lifetimes."
• Musk is set to play an influential role in Trump's second term as a co-lead for the DOGE.

Sen. Elizabeth Warren on Monday asked President-elect Donald Trump to set conflict-of-interest rules that would apply to Tesla CEO Elon Musk, who's set to take on a high-profile role as a co-lead of the Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE).

The Massachusetts Democrat and former 2020 presidential candidate sent the letter to Trump's transition team, according to The Washington Post, noting that the team's members have to adhere to an ethics policy that compels them to "avoid both actual and apparent conflicts of interest."

Musk, who spent over $250 million to help elect Trump and boost other GOP candidates ahead of the 2024 general election, has been one of Trump's most omnipresent confidants in recent months, accompanying the president-elect on trips and sitting in on his talks with world leaders.

Trump has tasked Musk and former GOP presidential candidate Vivek Ramaswamy with cutting government waste through the DOGE. The pair have said they want to cut $2 trillion from the federal budget.

"Putting Mr. Musk in a position to influence billions of dollars of government contracts and regulatory enforcement without a stringent conflict of interest agreement in place is an invitation for corruption on a scale not seen in our lifetimes," Warren said in her letter.

"Currently, the American public has no way of knowing whether the advice that he is whispering to you in secret is good for the country — or merely good for his own bottom line," she continued.

Trump spokesperson Karoline Leavitt in a statement to Business Insider responded to Warren by praising Musk's influence and criticizing the Democratic lawmaker. Leavitt called Warren a "career politician whose societal impact is 1/1024th of Elon Musk's" and said Trump's transition team was adhering to high ethical guidelines.

Musk was one of Trump's highest-profile surrogates during the presidential race, spending weeks campaigning for the president-elect in pivotal Pennsylvania, which Trump would go on to win en route to a national victory.

• Peter Thiel has been a major Trump supporter and spent big to help elect JD Vance to the Senate.
• He said he's not interested in working in Trump's new administration — at least full-time.
• He said politics is important but he'd be "depressed and crazy" if he thought about it all the time.

Peter Thiel was one of President-elect Donald Trump's first major supporters in Silicon Valley, donating more than $1 million to groups that supported Trump's 2016 campaign.

However, that doesn't mean he's interested in actually serving full-time in Trump's second administration.

"I'm not going to do anything on a full-time basis," Thiel said on "Piers Morgan Uncensored," an online talk show. "You can't go full-time into government if you've been in a tech position like I have. It's just — the sort of things you have to be realistic about, what you can and can't do."

As Trump has begun staffing his new administration, he's plucked a handful of figures from tech world. They include entrepreneur and investor David Sacks, who's set to serve as an AI and crypto czar in the new administration, and Jacob Helberg, who works at Palantir and was recently nominated to a role at the State Department.

Elon Musk is perhaps the biggest tech-world figure who's working with Trump these days. Along with Vivek Ramaswamy, Musk is set to co-lead the "Department of Government Efficiency," a new initiative to root out wasteful spending in the federal government. It isn't a full-time role for Musk, and DOGE won't have any formal authority on its own.

As Thiel offered cautious praise for DOGE, Morgan asked him whether he might consider an "Elon-style role" with Trump.

"It's just not my area of comparative advantage," Thiel said. "I think politics is very important… I enjoy going on your show, thinking about it every now and then. If I spent my whole life thinking about this, man, I'd be depressed and crazy."

Despite Thiel's apparent lack of interest in working in the government himself, he's had a significant impact on politics in recent years.

Thiel was instrumental in the political rise of Vice President-elect JD Vance, pouring millions of dollars into a super PAC that supported the Ohio senator's 2022 campaign.

Another close associate of Thiel, Blake Masters, is reportedly in the running to lead the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives (ATF) under Trump.

• Elon Musk has become one of Donald Trump's strongest political allies.
• Musk recently said his choice for the influential Treasury secretary role would be Howard Lutnick.
• Trump ultimately went with hedge fund manager Scott Bessent, however.

As President-elect Donald Trump assembles the key players to drive his new administration's agenda, Elon Musk is rarely far away.

From meetings at Mar-a-Lago in Florida to a weekend UFC match in New York, Musk has been a mainstay of Trump's political orbit in recent months. The Tesla CEO spent at least $119 million supporting the president-elect's 2024 campaign.

Musk is poised to be a high-profile player in Trump's second term. He's expected to serve as a co-lead of the forthcoming Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) alongside onetime GOP presidential contender Vivek Ramaswamy.

There seems, however, at least for now, some limit to Musk's influence on Trump.

Trump tapped hedge fund manager Scott Bessent, the founder and chief executive of Key Square Group, to be his next Treasury secretary on Friday. Bessent, a Wall Street veteran and a top economic advisor to Trump, emerged as a favorite of the president-elect while on the campaign trail this year.

Last Saturday, however, before Trump decided, Musk shared his thoughts about the Treasury job, writing in a post on X that Cantor Fitzgerald CEO Howard Lutnick would be a stronger choice.

"My view fwiw is that Bessent is a business-as-usual choice, whereas @howardlutnick will actually enact change," Musk wrote at the time. "Business-as-usual is driving America bankrupt, so we need change one way or another."

Days later, Trump nominated Lutnick as commerce secretary. If confirmed by the Senate, the veteran businessman — who strongly supported the president-elect's campaign — is set to drive the administration's trade policy.

That Trump went his own way in selecting Bessent for what is seen as the top economic role in any presidential administration may be an early sign of the limitations of Musk's relationship with the president-elect.

The Wall Street Journal reported that Trump sought advice from Wall Street leaders for the Treasury spot, and his advisors told him that analysts would view Bessent as a stabilizing figure.

Bessent's economic worldview has largely mirrored Trump's. Shortly after the election, the hedge fund manager argued in an op-ed that the country's competitiveness "has been weakened by destructive energy policies and the channeling of investment toward a quixotic energy transition."

"Allowing the private sector rather than the government to allocate capital is crucial to growth," he wrote. "Overhauling the regulatory and supervisory environment will encourage more lending and reinvigorate banks."

It's the sort of message that Trump touted as he campaigned for a second term. And, in his announcement of Bessent's nomination, he continued in that same vein, remarking that Bessent will "help me usher in a new Golden Age for the United States."

Musk did not immediately respond to a request for comment from Business Insider.

• Trump has nominated Howard Lutnick for commerce secretary.
• It's a pivotal pick given that economic concerns helped fuel Trump's win.
• Lutnick had been viewed as a frontrunner for the position of treasury secretary.

President-elect Donald Trump has nominated billionaire finance executive Howard Lutnick as his next commerce secretary.

"He will lead our Tariff and Trade agenda, with additional direct responsibility for the Office of the United States Trade Representative," Trump said in a statement first posted on Truth Social and later released by his transition team.

"Howard has created the most sophisticated process and system to assist us in creating the greatest Administration America has ever seen," Trump said.

Lutnick, who is Trump's transition team cochair alongside the WWE chief Linda McMahon, had been seen as a frontrunner for the treasury secretary position.

Lutnick even garnered the support of Elon Musk for the role. Despite some powerful backing, Lutnick's private jockeying for the role wore on those around Trump, according to multiple reports.

Now, with Lutnick out of the picture, Trump is likely nearing his final decision for his last major Cabinet appointment.

Commerce secretary will be a pivotal role in the Trump administration, given economic concerns played a key role in fueling Trump's victory.

As the chairman and CEO of Cantor Fitzgerald, Lutnick is a New York financial powerhouse. He's known Trump for decades and has hosted fundraisers for the president-elect and appeared on TV as a surrogate.

He spoke onstage at Trump's Madison Square Garden rally, touting the tariffs of yesteryear and Musk's forthcoming DOGE initiative alongside the Tesla billionaire.

Lutnick is known for steering Cantor Fitzgerald through the September 11, 2002, terrorist attacks.

The firm's offices were located at the top of one of the World Trade Center towers, and roughly two-thirds of its workforce was killed that day. It lost more workers on 9/11 than any other company.

Lutnick's brother was killed in the attack, but Lutnick survived because he happened to be taking his son to school that morning.