If you read this and it doesn't anger you in any way, you're probably an enemy of the country.
February 2, 2025 (Sunday)
"Billionaire Elon Musk’s team yesterday took control of the Treasury’s payment system, thus essentially gaining access to the checkbook with which the United States handles about $6 trillion annually and to all the financial information of Americans and American businesses with it. Apparently, it did not stop there.
Today Ellen Knickmeyer of the Associated Press reported that yesterday two top security officials from the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID) tried to stop people associated with Musk’s Department of Government Efficiency, or DOGE, from accessing classified information they did not have security clearance to see. The Trump administration put the officials on leave, and the DOGE team gained access to the information.
Vittoria Elliott of Wired has identified those associated with Musk’s takeover as six “engineers who are barely out of—and in at least one case, purportedly still in—college.” They are connected either to Musk or to his long-time associate Peter Thiel, who backed J.D. Vance’s Senate run eighteen months before he became Trump’s vice presidential running mate. Their names are Akash Bobba, Edward Coristine, Luke Farritor, Gautier Cole Killian, Gavin Kliger, and Ethan Shaotran, and they have little to no experience in government.
Public policy expert Dan Moynihan told reporter Elliott that the fact these people “are not really public officials” makes it hard for Congress to intervene. “So this feels like a hostile takeover of the machinery of governments by the richest man in the world,” he said. Law professor Nick Bednar noted that “it is very unlikely” that the engineers “have the expertise to understand either the law or the administration needs that surround these agencies.”
After Musk’s team breached the USAID computers, cybersecurity specialist Matthew Garrett posted: “Random computers being plugged into federal networks is obviously terrifying in terms of what data they're deliberately accessing, but it's also terrifying because it implies controls are being disabled—unmanaged systems should never have access to this data. Who else has access to those systems?”
USAID receives foreign policy guidance from the State Department. Intelligence agencies must now assume U.S. intelligence systems are insecure.
Musk’s response was to post: “USAID is a criminal organization. Time for it to die.” Also last night, according to Sam Stein of The Bulwark, “the majority of staff in the legislative and public affairs bureau lost access to their emails, implying they’ve been put on admin leave although this was never communicated to them.”
Congress established USAID in 1961 to bring together the many different programs that were administering foreign aid. Focusing on long-term socioeconomic development, USAID has a budget of more than $50 billion, less than 1% of the U.S. annual budget. It is one of the largest aid agencies in the world.
Musk is unelected, and it appears that DOGE has no legal authority. As political scientist Seth Masket put it in tusk: “Elon Musk is not a federal employee, nor has he been appointed by the President nor approved by the Senate to have any leadership role in government. The ‘Department of Government Efficiency,’ announced by Trump in a January 20th executive order, is not truly any sort of government department or agency, and even the executive order uses quotes in the title. It’s perfectly fine to have a marketing gimmick like this, but DOGE does not have power over established government agencies, and Musk has no role in government. It does not matter that he is an ally of the President. Musk is a private citizen taking control of established government offices. That is not efficiency; that is a coup.”
DOGE has simply taken over government systems. Musk, using President Donald Trump’s name, is personally deciding what he thinks should be cut from the U.S. government.
Today, Musk reposted a social media post from MAGA religious extremist General Mike Flynn, who resigned from his position as Trump’s national security advisor in 2017 after pleading guilty to secret conversations with a Russian agent—for which Trump pardoned him—and who publicly embraced the QAnon conspiracy theory. In today’s post, Flynn complained about “the ‘Lutheran’ faith” and, referring to federal grants provided to Lutheran Family Services and affiliated organizations, said, “this use of ‘religion’ as a money laundering operation must end.” Musk added: “The [DOGE] team is rapidly shutting down these illegal payments.”
In fact, this is money appropriated by Congress, and its payment is required by law. Republican lawmakers have pushed government subsidies and grants toward religious organizations for years, and Lutheran Social Services is one of the largest employers in South Dakota, where it operates senior living facilities."
Hint: Privacy Act of 1974
