Elon Musk, the leader of the Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE), suggested last week that 89-year-old former Congressman Ron Paul (R-TX), author of the 2009 book End the Fed, be named the Federal Reserve’s new chair during the second Trump administration.

Senator Rand Paul (R-KY), Paul’s son, is now urging President Donald Trump and Musk to audit the country’s gold stockpile at Fort Knox, after a user on X commented, “Would be nice if @elonmusk could take a look inside Fort Knox just to make sure the 4,580 tons of US gold is there. The last time anyone checked was 50 years ago, in 1974.” Musk replied, “Surely it is reviewed at least once a year.” Rand Paul responded, “Nope.” Let’s do it.”

: In 2011, Ron Paul introduced legislation to have the famous fort in Louisville audited. The U.S. Mint says Fort Knox houses approximately 9.2 million pounds worth of gold, which is about half of the Treasury’s reserve gold. [Paul claimed at the time that the “Treasury Department has been less than transparent with the results of its gold audits. It is asking the American people to trust that all the gold is there, while not allowing site visits and not publishing all the data it holds on its audits and assays.”] Despite the concerns of Musk and Paul, the Fort Knox gold hasn’t gone without any attention all this time.
While Trump’s new Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent has yet to release an announcement regarding a potential future audit of Fort Knox, his predecessor from the first Trump administration, former Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin, has visited the bullion depository and held a bar of government-owned gold.

In August 2017, Mnuchin and a few other officials including Senator Mitch McConnell (R-KY) were treated to a tour of the depository, traveling there in an Air Force C-37B aircraft at a cost of $26,900.25.
The trip coincided with a solar eclipse, for which Kentucky was a popular viewing location, raising suspicions that the trip was an excuse to see the natural phenomenon. The department’s inspector general later investigated and found no evidence of wrongdoing.