Maddow Blog | The ‘DOGE’ power grabs are unlike anything Americans have seen before

It’s the kind of office that most Americans never have to think about, but which serves a critically important purpose. The Bureau of the Fiscal Service at the Department of the Treasury oversees what is effectively the nation’s checkbook, overseeing trillions of dollars in federal expenditures.

Social Security and Medicare benefits? The money goes through this system. Payments to government contractors? The money goes through this system. IRS refunds? The money goes through this system. And so on.

For reasons that should be obvious, access to the federal checkbook tends to be limited to a small number of career officials, which made it problematic when people affiliated with Elon Musk’s “Department of Government Efficiency” sought access to the highly sensitive Treasury system for reasons unknown.

David Lebryk, a longtime veteran of the department and the acting Treasury secretary before last week, did exactly what a responsible adult in his position should’ve done in response to the requests: He told Musk’s surrogates that they could not have access. Predictably, Trump appointees put Lebryk on administrative leave, and as The Washington Post reported, the career official, who had served in nonpolitical roles at Treasury for several decades, retired soon after.

With Lebryk out of the way, and with Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent’s blessing, associates of the billionaire Republican megadonor quickly gained the access they sought. The New York Times reported:

Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent gave representatives of the so-called Department of Government Efficiency access to the federal payment system late on Friday, according to five people familiar with the change, handing Elon Musk and the team he is leading a powerful tool to monitor and potentially limit government spending.

On Friday afternoon, a reporter asked President Donald Trump directly whether Musk or others at his so-called “department” have direct access to the system through which the government disperses funds. “No, nothing,” he replied.

That might’ve been true at that moment, but it’s not true now.

There’s still great uncertainty surrounding what, exactly, Musk’s surrogates intend to do with the Treasury system, though the Times’ report added that it could give the Trump administration “another mechanism to attempt to unilaterally restrict disbursement of money approved for specific purposes by Congress, a push that has faced legal roadblocks.”

Indeed, Musk has already claimed that his fake department is “shutting down” payments that he and his associates have deemed “illegal,” though (a) it’s not yet clear if this is actually happening; and (b) DOGE has no authority to overrule Congress on allocation of federal funds.

What’s more, as the world’s wealthiest individual and his friends gain access to highly sensitive information — including, in all likelihood, your Social Security number — it’s probably fair to characterize this as the most dramatic data breach in the history of the world.

Making matters vastly worse, there’s no reason to see this as an isolated incident. On the contrary, Musk and his cohorts appear to be approaching a variety of government agencies in a systematic way.

NBC News reported, for example, that Musk’s surrogates also wanted to access to personnel files and security systems, including classified systems, at the U.S. Agency for International Development. When the agency’s director of security and his deputy balked, they were placed on administrative leave — but not before DOGE representatives threatened to call U.S. marshals.

NBC News also reported that according to Musk, he and Trump are “in the process” of “shutting down USAID,” which the billionaire condemned as “a criminal organization.”

Meanwhile, at the Office of Personnel Management, which oversees the entire civilian government workforce, Musk’s associates reportedly have locked career civil servants out of computer systems. They’ve also reportedly taken on new roles overseeing the General Services Administration, which manages federal offices and technology.

And for good measure, let’s not forget that the National Transportation Safety Board also announced that, going forward, it will only distribute public notifications by way of the social media platform that Musk owns.

I’m trying to think of a parallel for this kind of power grab in American history. Nothing comes to mind.

This article was originally published on MSNBC.com

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