Visitors to the US Department of Housing and Urban Development's headquarters in the capital got some unpleasant viewing on Monday morning after TV screens across the building began showing a deepfake video of President Trump kissing and sucking Elon Musk's toes.

The AI-generated footage had been circulating online over the weekend on social media, but the [1]video was displayed on monitors at HUD on Monday morning, along with the message: "Long live the real king."

(For those who don't know, that's a reference to Republican President Trump [2]yelling on state social media the other day "long live the king," referring to himself as a monarch. Elon, meanwhile, was recruited by Trump to, under the [3]DOGE project, [4]run through federal organizations to cut programs, contracts, and thousands of staff the Tesla tycoon doesn't approve of, and thus has been likened by some as the real president of the United States, especially given this earlier [5]baffling [6]press conference in the Oval Office.)

[7]

HUD staff [8]reportedly resorted to unplugging the screens after failing to get the video removed from sight, and the agency is investigating.

[9]

[10]

"Another waste of taxpayer dollars and resources," HUD spokesperson Kasey Lovett told The Register . "Appropriate action will be taken for all involved."

The video is a pretty bad deepfake - Musk has two left feet for example, something not seen [11]outside of comedy classic Best In Show. We've asked HUD for an explanation of how the video was spammed out to appear on the monitors, and will update as more information comes in.

[12]National Science Foundation staff axed by Trump fear for US scientific future

[13]Trump can't quickly or easily kill the CHIPS Act, but he can fire the workers funded by it

[14]Does DOGE have what it takes to actually tackle billions in US govt IT spending?

[15]DOGE geek with Treasury payment system access now quits amid racist tweet claims

Staff might have reason to be peeved. According to documents [16]seen by NPR, Musk's DOGE operation plans to slash the headcount at the agency. HUD deals with housing issues, homelessness, and supporting homeowners, and it's clear that someone in the org isn't keen on the current plans to slim down the workforce.

Week sauce

This past weekend, federal government workers also [17]received an email from the US government's HR outfit - the now-DOGE-directed [18]Office of Personnel Management - that has ruffled some feathers, not least at HUD. The message, sent to as many as 2.3 million or more staff, asked them each to reply with a list of five things they had accomplished in the last week, cc'ing their managers, and a tweet from Musk claimed that "failure to respond will be taken as a resignation."

The FBI, the State Department, FEMA, the DHS, and the Pentagon warned staff [19]not to comply with these emails. There's also some doubt over the legality of sacking government workers on this basis, and also whether anyone would actually read all the replies or whether AI would be used to process it.

[20]

Late Sunday, the SpaceX supremo [21]shed some light on the alleged reasoning behind sending that demand, as push-back from officials grew and workers refused to participate or were ordered not to: Musk asked for the lists of accomplishments from millions of people because he wanted to see "who had a pulse and two working neurons." The billionaire seems to be [22]under the impression fraudsters are collecting paychecks from the federal coffers for dead or ex-employees, and that some people aren't even checking their email.

Asking more than a million people, some handling sensitive subjects, to reply to an email about their past week might also be seen as not a particularly productive use of time.

The job cuts in the US civil service are continuing under DOGE's direction following an [23]executive order for widespread cost savings, however. As we've noted, the National Science Foundation is [24]facing potentially catastrophic staff losses and it is not alone. NASA, in particular, is facing [25]uncertainty .

[26]

It was just [27]reported at least 130 people out of 3,000 or so at CISA are facing the ax, too. We've asked the cybersecurity agency to confirm, and it referred us to Homeland Security.

The HUD video situation has now been resolved, in that there are no video screens displaying the material, we're told. ®

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[1] https://x.com/krassenstein/status/1894047931738558515

[2] https://x.com/WhiteHouse/status/1892295984928993698

[3] https://search.theregister.com/?q=doge

[4] https://www.theregister.com/2025/02/07/opinion_column_musk/

[5] https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-14390495/elon-musk-son-x-donald-trump-resolute-desk.html

[6] https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2025/feb/23/elon-musks-four-year-old-son-blended-in-perfectly-in-the-oval-office-with-all-the-other-bogeymen

[7] https://pubads.g.doubleclick.net/gampad/jump?co=1&iu=/6978/reg_onprem/publicsector&sz=300x50%7C300x100%7C300x250%7C300x251%7C300x252%7C300x600%7C300x601&tile=2&c=2Z7z6Ff9jyF4FcyWCI7XkfwAAAFI&t=ct%3Dns%26unitnum%3D2%26raptor%3Dcondor%26pos%3Dtop%26test%3D0

[8] https://bsky.app/profile/marisakabas.bsky.social/post/3liwlwvvq6k2s

[9] https://pubads.g.doubleclick.net/gampad/jump?co=1&iu=/6978/reg_onprem/publicsector&sz=300x50%7C300x100%7C300x250%7C300x251%7C300x252%7C300x600%7C300x601&tile=4&c=44Z7z6Ff9jyF4FcyWCI7XkfwAAAFI&t=ct%3Dns%26unitnum%3D4%26raptor%3Dfalcon%26pos%3Dmid%26test%3D0

[10] https://pubads.g.doubleclick.net/gampad/jump?co=1&iu=/6978/reg_onprem/publicsector&sz=300x50%7C300x100%7C300x250%7C300x251%7C300x252%7C300x600%7C300x601&tile=3&c=33Z7z6Ff9jyF4FcyWCI7XkfwAAAFI&t=ct%3Dns%26unitnum%3D3%26raptor%3Deagle%26pos%3Dmid%26test%3D0

[11] https://youtu.be/Imyqnop6grY?t=75

[12] https://www.theregister.com/2025/02/21/nsf_staff_cut/

[13] https://www.theregister.com/2025/02/19/trump_layoffs_nist/

[14] https://www.theregister.com/2025/02/08/doge_us_goverment_tech_spending/

[15] https://www.theregister.com/2025/02/07/doge_staffer_twitter/

[16] https://www.npr.org/2025/02/22/g-s1-50199/doge-trump-hud-cuts-homeless-housing-programs

[17] https://www.npr.org/2025/02/22/nx-s1-5305834/elon-musk-federal-employees-email-opm

[18] https://www.theregister.com/2025/02/06/democrats_opm_server/

[19] https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/cj0qrj20g5vo

[20] https://pubads.g.doubleclick.net/gampad/jump?co=1&iu=/6978/reg_onprem/publicsector&sz=300x50%7C300x100%7C300x250%7C300x251%7C300x252%7C300x600%7C300x601&tile=4&c=44Z7z6Ff9jyF4FcyWCI7XkfwAAAFI&t=ct%3Dns%26unitnum%3D4%26raptor%3Dfalcon%26pos%3Dmid%26test%3D0

[21] https://nypost.com/2025/02/24/us-news/musk-explains-email-to-federal-workers-as-intelligence-officers-asked-to-ignore/

[22] https://x.com/elonmusk/status/1893657900851278115

[23] https://www.whitehouse.gov/presidential-actions/2025/02/implementing-the-presidents-department-of-government-efficiency-workforce-optimization-initiative/

[24] https://www.theregister.com/2025/02/21/nsf_staff_cut/

[25] https://www.theregister.com/2025/02/20/nasa_comment_piece/

[26] https://pubads.g.doubleclick.net/gampad/jump?co=1&iu=/6978/reg_onprem/publicsector&sz=300x50%7C300x100%7C300x250%7C300x251%7C300x252%7C300x600%7C300x601&tile=3&c=33Z7z6Ff9jyF4FcyWCI7XkfwAAAFI&t=ct%3Dns%26unitnum%3D3%26raptor%3Deagle%26pos%3Dmid%26test%3D0

[27] https://krebsonsecurity.com/2025/02/trump-2-0-brings-cuts-to-cyber-consumer-protections/

[28] https://whitepapers.theregister.com/