Time Magazine Friday coverage Dépisse Elon Musk behind the office resolved in the oval office of the White House, a seat generally reserved for the president, seeming to imply that the richest man in the world has greater power in Washington than even President Donald Trump.
Musk, who spent About 288 million dollars WE To make the election of Trump, obtained a level of access to the Federal Payment System of the United States government which is unprecedented for a private, and its actions have already triggered demonstrations and prosecution.
Musk used its access to the system, responsible for the flow of more than 6 billions of US dollars in payments to American families and companies, to largely dismantle the American agency for international development (USAID), the foreign aid agency and interfere with the state agencies and organizations of the federal government.
Friday, a federal judge said that he would temporarily prevent the Trump administration from placing 2,200 USAID employees on paid leave, however, the seat of workers who argued that the president did not have the authority of Quickly dismantle the six -decades aid agency devoted to congress law.
The Musk Government Department (DOGE), which seems to include a team of a dozen young men previously unknown to the United States government, has raised concerns about the compromise of private information from the Americans, while leaving many uncertain government employees of their employment status.
Musk’s own companies, which include SpaceX and Tesla, have obtained billions of dollars in American government contracts, which raises new concerns about conflicts of potential interests.
Here are some of the questions raised on the recent actions of Doge.
Confidentiality and security
Democratic legislators are looking for an investigation by the Treasury Department on the Musk access team was given to the government’s payment system, citing “threats to economics and national security, and the potential violation of laws protecting the privacy and tax data of Americans “.
The payment system manages tax reimbursements, social security services and much more, which raises questions about the question of whether the Doge exam is legal. Any rupture in the system could signify missed payments to people or even to the sharing of sensitive personal data.
Nineteen Democratic prosecutors continued Trump on Friday to prevent Doge from accessing the files of the Treasury Department containing sensitive personal data. The case, filed with the New York Federal Court, alleged that the Trump administration has enabled the Musk team to access the central payment system of the ministry in violation of the federal law.
The Treasury Department argued that its examination only concerns the evaluation of the integrity of the system and that no modification is made to it.
Secret
In a letter to the interim education secretary, a group of democrats demanded details on Doge’s work and promised to fight against any attempt to close the education department, which was disturbed while Trump is aimed to abolish it.
Dozens of employees have been placed on leave paid with few explanations, and the workers of Doge began to browse the files of the department while they seek to reduce expenses.
The DOGE team has already had access to a database living in personal information on millions of students and parents with federal student loans, according to two people knowing the problem. A third person said that DOGE would have granted the administrator to access the ministry’s website on Friday, allowing Musk workers to modify the text on any page or to remove the offline site.
Not elected, but authorized by American president Donald Trump to reduce government waste, the richest man in the world Elon Musk faces growing resistance to his reduction in jobs and federal departments in what a Democratic Senator called a “ illegal power entry ”.
A federal trial filed on Friday seeks to block the access of DOGE to financial assistance systems for students, calling it a huge and unprecedented invasion of privacy “which violates the rights to the confidentiality of millions of federal borrowers of federal borrowers Student loan.
He says that DOGE could now have access to social security numbers, driving license numbers, birth dates and coordinates of student loan borrowers.
The Department of Education said that Doge helped him return to work in person, restore employee responsibility and reform the job process to focus on merit. He said that there is “nothing inappropriate or in a harmful manner”.
Conflict of interest
A group of unions continued to prevent Doge workers from the Systems of the US Labor Department, which they say, contain sensitive information on workers, including those who have filed security complaints concerning their employers.
The Labor Department also has information on surveys on SpaceX and Tesla, and on the competitors’ trade secrets, unions said in their trial. The ministry is home to occupational safety and health, which has investigated and sentenced to a fine of SpaceX and Tesla in connection with workers’ safety, unions said in court documents.
A federal judge envisaged Friday if he should prevent the Musk team from access to systems in the Labor Department, although the hearing finished without a decision.
“At each stage,” wrote the lawyers of the unions represented by the group for defense of the group’s democracy, “Doge raped several laws, against the constitutional limits of the executive power, to the laws protecting civil servants against arbitrary threats and the Disappointed action, to crucial protections for government data collected and stored on hundreds of millions of Americans.
The Ministry of Justice said that unions were only speculating and the employees of Doge would not have had access to the information that is worried.
Employee questions
Gavin Kliger lists his job on LinkedIn as a “special advisor to the director” at the staff management office, which was launched Musk’s efforts to reduce the federal workforce.
In the publications on social networks between October 2024 and January, the educated computer scientist of Berkeley expressed controversial views and republished the content of the white supremacist Nick Fuentes and the misogynist which describes Andrew Tate.
Kliger is part of a dozen men identified by Reuters and other media who were recruited by Musk and his Doge Office.
Senator Elizabeth Warren and other Democratic legislators spoke during a rally outside the US Treasury Department on February 4, 2025, after the Elon Musk technological billionaire had access to her payment system and to Government sensitive databases.
Another member of DOGE staff, Marko Elez, left Thursday in the midst of questions Wall Street Journal On the links to an deleted social media account which recommended racism and eugenics.
Musk said on Friday that he would rehire Elez.
Reuters could not determine how Elez, Kliger or one of the people working with Musk to reduce the government and the staff were selected for their employment.
A White House official told Reuters on Wednesday that Musk and his engineers had appropriate security authorizations and operated in “full compliance with federal law, appropriate security authorizations and as an employee of the agencies concerned, and not As an external advisers or entities “.
