Behind the scenes, cabinet secretaries compared notes as they tried to figure out how to respond to a directive from President Trump’s most powerful adviser without angering the president.

On this special episode of “Uncanny Valley,” we dig into the many DOGE staffers keeping two jobs at once, plus what happened when US federal workers received an email from Elon Musk over the weekend.

Elon Musk caused alarm among federal employees and drew ire over an email sent on Saturday requesting that employees summarize their work for the week, and warning on social media that a failure to do so would be taken as a resignation.

Federal workers faced conflicting guidance from the president, their agencies and union leaders around a request to detail their professional accomplishments over the past week.

Elon Musk clarified the goals of the email sent to every federal employee this weekend asking them to document what they worked on last week in five bullet points, first cabinet meeting of this term on Wednesday.

Agencies issue conflicting guidance on whether to comply with the request.

Chris Hayes explains why Elon Musk's commanding presence at Trump's Cabinet meeting, despite several costly DOGE mistakes, may reveal who really has the power.

This is not a technology problem, this is a process problem,” said Scott Cory, a former chief information officer in one of the Department of Health and Human Services sub-agencies.

"You know, we got a partial response. We are going to send another email," Musk said while attending President Donald Trump's first cabinet meeting.