Elon Musk, as you may recall, is not an elected official. Nor is he a Senate-confirmed appointee. He's not even an appointee to a job or a department that has been given Congressional approval. The only difference between him, and any reader of this site, governmentally speaking, is that he has the ear of the President, and the President is listening. And Musk, being a ruthless and power-obsessed kind of person, is quickly accruing power that is verging on king-like. Or duce-like, if you prefer.
Before we continue, let us note that the details here are... shaky, in some cases. Musk is trying to keep things under the radar as much as possible, and he is enabled in that by more than a few folks, including Donald Trump himself, who are more than willing to lie as needed. So, while we think we have a decent handle on what's going on, keep in mind that new details could emerge at any moment.
To start, it is now clear that the assault on USAID was just the opening volley, sort of a fiscal version of Pearl Harbor. There is still much wrangling going on, on that front, with Democratic politicians and USAID staffers trying to access USAID's offices, and Musk and his minions physically blocking them. Meanwhile, Secretary of State Marco Rubio announced yesterday that he is now the acting director of USAID. On whose authority he has gained that new title is not clear.
The USAID maneuvering is clearly illegal, and is clearly a direct assault on the authority of Congress, one that carries the message, "Oh, yeah? What're ya gonna do about it?" But that's not the worst of it. Not by a long shot. As we wrote yesterday, Musk and his DOGE underlings have apparently gained access to a number of critical federal computer systems. We specifically noted the Treasury's payment system, which is properly called the ACH Network and handles the government's financial transactions.
In addition, Musk and his team have access to the Office of Personnel Management's federal human resources databases, which contain all sorts of personal information about federal employees, from SSNs and addresses to personnel reviews and medical histories. If that is not enough, Musk has reportedly gained access to the FDIC system, which basically monitors bank deposits. If that system is altered, or shut down, it could be Wild West time for the banks. And we all know how well unencumbered banking worked out in 2008 (to take just one example).
At this point, let us note that the folks doing most of the hands-on work for Musk are a half-dozen young men best described as "hackers," and who all have pre-existing ties to either Musk, or Peter Thiel, or both. They are also quite young, ranging in ages from 18 to 25. It presumably goes without saying that tech-minded fellows who are that young are going to be blown away by Musk's charisma and wealth, and should be expected to remain fiercely loyal to him.
We will also point out that the Trump administration is still pretending that Musk and his minions have not been given any sort of serious access to the government's systems. For example, newly approved Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent promised Republican lawmakers yesterday that Musk & Co. do not have control over the ACH Network. Depending on how you interpret that, it's either an outright lie, or it's carefully chosen to be misleading (since you could have total access to a system without technically having "control" of it). In any event, WIRED has been all over this, since it's their jam (tech bros from Silicon Valley). And that outlet has reported that 25-year-old engineer Marko Elez most definitely has access to the ACH system, while current Cal undergrad Akash Bobba has access to the OPM databases. Others might well have access, too—these are just the ones that have been confirmed by multiple inside sources.
With the access that Musk has, there are all kinds of abuses he could commit. Among them:
There is actually some circumstantial evidence that finding ways he can personally profit is at least a pert of the motive here. He's already been working to make eX-Twitter into a financial services hub, and he's already used his influence to make eX-Twitter an official platform for various government purposes (for example, it is now the exclusive platform for releases from the NTSB—no press releases, no e-mails, no fact sheets, just tweets). Some folks have guessed that we're not far off from a leap to "eX-Twitter takes over for ACH, and becomes the routing point for all federal transactions." If that thought doesn't scare you, we don't know what will.
It hardly needs to be said that there are all kinds of laws being broken here, by both Musk and by his techno-team. However, laws don't matter too much when: (1) a pliant DoJ has no interest in prosecuting, and (2) a pliant president is more than willing to issue a pardon, should it be needed. Or two pardons, or ten, even.
Those who are bothered by all of these developments are doing what they can to fight back. A couple of federal employees' unions have filed a lawsuit trying to get Musk's hands off the ACH system and the OPM database. Democratic officeholders are screaming bloody murder and are trying to get in front of cameras and microphones as much as they possibly can in order to get the message out. House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries (D-NY) unveiled a 10-point plan covering some of the ways that he and his colleagues will try to hold the administration's feet to the fire.
That said, Jeffries is not quite ready to play GOP-style hardball yet. Or, if he is, he's not saying so publicly. Most of what he lays out in his 10-point plan is mostly symbolic, like introducing messaging legislation that will never see the floor of the House. If and when the blue team decides to roll up their sleeves and get dirty, there ARE things they can do that will hurt the GOP a fair bit. For example, as long as Trump and Musk are doing end runs around the Impoundment Control Act, Senate Democrats could refuse unanimous consent for EVERYTHING, thus slowing the Senate down to a snail's pace. Similarly, when it comes time to deal with the budget and the debt ceiling, the Democrats could make clear that the price of even one vote from them is an agreement to pass whatever legislation is necessary to get Musk under control. Again, the Democrats don't much like to play ball that is quite this hard. But they may have no choice. (Z)