‘Big B***s' goes public: Elon Musk's Gen Z whiz kid Edward Coristine speaks out on fraud, dead people, and fruit jam diplomacy

Time of India

02-05-2025

19-year-old
Edward Coristine
, better known online as 'Big Balls', made his first public appearance as part of Musk's
Department of Government Efficiency
(DOGE) during a special edition of Watters' World on Fox News. The teenager, who works in the State Department's Bureau of Diplomatic Technology, joined his Gen Z colleagues for a roundtable discussion that doubled as a final victory lap for Musk, who is stepping away from
DOGE
next month.
'I just set it as my LinkedIn username,' Coristine said when asked about his vulgar nickname. 'People on LinkedIn take themselves super seriously and are pretty averse to risk. I was like, I want to be neither of those things.'
Musk laughed along with the panel, which took aim at a range of federal agencies, and their favorite target,
government inefficiency
.
'Computer stuff' and 120-year-olds on social security
Coristine explained his job as 'working on computer stuff,' primarily focused on tracing federal payments no one can fully explain. 'You look at a line item, $20 million, what's it going to? For the majority of payment systems, it's like, we don't really know,' he said.
The DOGE team revived Musk's earlier claims about the Social Security Administration paying benefits to centenarians—some supposedly older than 120. 'Safe to say if anybody is in the system as 115 years or older, that is fake,' Musk said.
But as critics, including a former SSA commissioner, have pointed out, the bizarre birthdates often stem from a default placeholder in outdated systems, May 20, 1875, used when no valid date is available.
Jam, peas, and the retirement cave
Musk also pointed to wasteful spending abroad, mocking programs like 'improving the marketability of peas in Guatemala' or funding 'alpaca farmers in Peru' through the Inter-American Foundation (IAF). Despite its $50 million budget, he said only 58% reached grantees—'the rest goes to travel, management, and DC overhead.'
'There's a lot of fruit jam, not a lot of fruit,' one DOGE member joked.
Another DOGE agent recounted his visit to a federal 'retirement cave' in Boyers, Pennsylvania, where all retirement paperwork is still done by hand. 'It's like time travel,' he said, pointing to the need for sweeping digital reforms.
End of the line for DOGE?
The primetime appearance comes asMusk prepares to scale back his involvement in DOGE, citing business commitments. Tesla's Q1 performance has been weak, hampered by Trump's tariffs—ironically, policies Musk publicly opposed.
'Starting in May, my time allocation to DOGE will drop significantly,' Musk said on a Tesla earnings call last week.
At a Cabinet meeting Wednesday, Trump acknowledged Musk's contributions: 'You really have sacrificed a lot.'
With Musk on his way out and 'Big Balls' now a public figure, DOGE may be nearing the end of its strange, chaotic run.
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