Department of Govt Efficiency (DOGE)

mickeyrat

“Are we going to break something?” Dudek asked, referring to what DOGE has been doing with Social Security data. “I don’t know.

Read more: https://propub.li/4hGls7T

mickeyrat

Over the past several weeks, ProPublica has identified dozens of people who worked for DOGE. Now we've added 20 names to the list, bringing the total to 66: https://propub.li/43Sx2JZ

mickeyrat

https://www.threads.net/@keithboykin/post/DHTPHb4xfuO?xmt=AQGzZNSfqMIugwgfYdBnHE3N-ik_zlFqdsdGeJ7xtpfY8Q

The National Nuclear Security Administration that manages the nation’s 3,748 nuclear bombs and warheads "has lost a huge cadre of scientists, engineers, safety experts, project officers, and other key staff in the past six weeks. Many who left held a top-secret security clearance, called Q, that gave them access to information about how nuclear weapons are designed, produced and used.

Merkin Baller

Why tax billionaires when you can just cut funding to children's hospitals? 

https://www.boston.com/news/health/2025/03/18/healey-says-cuts-to-childrens-hospital-funding-could-be-devastating/?p1=hp_featurestack

josevolution

Only white and rich people deserve help everyone else in between can go 🖕🏽🖕🏽themselves! 

JeBurkhardt

josevolution said:

Only white and rich people deserve help everyone else in between can go 🖕🏽🖕🏽themselves! 

Making America Great Again...if you belong to that class ^

Bentleyspop

josevolution said:

Only white and rich people deserve help everyone else in between can go 🖕🏽🖕🏽themselves! 

You meant to say old obese wealthy white men who claim to be straight and "christian."

hunterh75

Bentleyspop said:

josevolution said:

Only white and rich people deserve help everyone else in between can go 🖕🏽🖕🏽themselves! 

You meant to say old obese wealthy white men who claim to be straight and "christian."

Like the front row of most PJ shows. 

Tim Simmons

mickeyrat

With Gleason in place, Musk would be potentially shielded from some legal responsibility and questions about conflicts, experts say.

One person who has been in meetings with Gleason said, “I get the sense that Amy is in the role of scapegoat.”

Read more: https://propub.li/4bKqjnr

Halifax2TheMax

Had he identified himself as representing POGE, they would have handed over the keys and headed toward the unemployment office.

https://www.nbcnews.com/news/us-news/pirates-booty-founder-stages-long-island-mutiny-declares-mayor-tries-f-rcna197308

josevolution

Halifax2TheMax said:

Had he identified himself as representing POGE, they would have handed over the keys and headed toward the unemployment office.

https://www.nbcnews.com/news/us-news/pirates-booty-founder-stages-long-island-mutiny-declares-mayor-tries-f-rcna197308

😂 I grew up a town over from Sea Cliff 

mickeyrat

Elon Musk Made No Promises
So with Trump’s blessing, he is going after Social Security
Dan Rather and Team Steady
Mar 21
 
Members of Congress, those brave enough to hold town hall meetings while home over spring recess, may have become reacquainted with an old lesson: Hell hath no fury like an angry constituent. And that goes double for anyone who threatens Social Security.

Across the country, we have seen reports of meetings where hundreds of constituents have shown up to raise the roof with their representative.

At a meeting in Baltimore, a woman said, “We need people to get mad.” Another responded, “We earned our Social Security!”

In Michigan, a disabled man told his Republican representative, “We worked our entire life, but we can’t get any help because we can’t get through to anybody.”

At an Iowa town hall: “Go to a local office. Try to get an appointment! Right now you’re waiting a month. And we’re going to cut more staff?”

Politicians from both parties got an earful.

It feels like a bait-and-switch, a common Trump tactic. Sure, he made a plethora of promises not to cut Social Security. Elon Musk didn’t.

Trump and Musk must be betting that Americans care more about possible waste, fraud, and abuse at the Social Security Administration (SSA) than they do about getting their monthly benefit checks.

That’s a bad bet.

Nearly 73 million elderly and disabled Americans receive $1.6 trillion annually in Social Security benefits. It is one of the most popular and most important government services. And it is funded directly by working Americans in the form of a payroll tax.

Musk has made his feelings about the program crystal clear, calling it a “Ponzi scheme” and claiming $500 to $700 billion in annual waste and fraud. To date he has offered no supporting evidence.

Regardless of these claims of waste and fraud, Musk is doubling down and using this vital program as the political football du jour. Musk and his DOGE assistants have been trying to access the personal information of hundreds of millions of Americans in what they call their hunt for waste and fraud. Two labor unions and an advocacy group have sued to stop them.

Yesterday a federal judge agreed that giving DOGE “affiliates,” or employees under Musk, “unbridled access” likely violates privacy laws. The judge issued a temporary restraining order, stating DOGE affiliates were barred from accessing Social Security information systems.

“The DOGE Team is essentially engaged in a fishing expedition at SSA, in search of a fraud epidemic, based on little more than suspicion. It has launched a search for the proverbial needle in the haystack, without any concrete knowledge that the needle is in the haystack,” wrote U.S. District Judge Ellen Lipton Hollander in her ruling.

In response, acting Social Security Administration Commissioner Lee Dudek threatened to shut down the entire agency. Rather than honor the judge’s order and keep working for the millions of Americans who rely on their monthly Social Security checks, he said that any employee could be a DOGE worker, so, “I will follow [the ruling] exactly and terminate access by all SSA employees to our IT systems.”

With the Social Security Administration squarely in Musk’s crosshairs, he is also taking aim at the program itself, without cutting actual payouts — yet. Though the net effect will be a delay or reduction in benefits for many Americans.

With no authority other than Trump saying he can, Musk, who has manipulated and bought his way into the system, is cutting 7,000 jobs at SSA, or 12% of the workforce, and closing more than 40 field offices. Closing those offices is a terrible idea for an agency where getting an in-person appointment is already notoriously difficult.

But wait, there’s more. Recipients can no longer file for benefits by phone. Instead they have to verify their identity online or in person.

Forcing older and disabled Americans to find an internet-ready computer and then navigate a new online system is almost as bad as making them try to get an in-person appointment while closing dozens of offices.

An internal SSA memo by a senior official accessed by The Washington Post admitted that these changes “increased challenges for vulnerable populations.” The senior official was not on the same page as her boss.

“These changes are not intended to hurt our customers,” Lee Dudek said in a Tuesday news conference. Intentional or not, it is hard to imagine that the changes won’t hurt seniors.

“If it is to the detriment of the citizens we serve, then we’ll take necessary actions. If that means backing out the policy, then we’ll back it out. But we need to see what the results are,” Dudek continued. In other words, Social Security recipients, some of whom rely solely on this benefit to eat, are human guinea pigs in Musk’s efficiency experiment.

Though Trump has claimed that 20 million people on the Social Security rolls are so old they must be dead, widespread fraud has not been found. The Social Security inspector general found less than 1% of payouts from 2015-2022 were considered improper.

A former SSA official told Axios that the money it would cost to implement Musk’s changes would be significantly more than any cost savings.

Might this be this issue that gets the Democrats united and focused?

Democratic Senator Kirsten Gillibrand said on X, “Make no mistake, this is a full-blown attack on Social Security. Elon Musk is trying to take away benefits you earned.”

Most older voters receive Social Security checks. And they vote … in larger numbers than any other age group. In fact, 72% voted in the 2020 presidential election. And guess what those voters’ No. 1 issue is? Social Security. We soon shall see where this latest full-frontal attack on Social Security leads.

No matter how you subscribe, I thank you for reading.

Stay Steady,
Dan


 
© 2025 Dan Rather
3939 Bee Cave Rd., Bldg. C-100, Austin, Texas 78746
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mickeyrat

https://www.threads.net/@reuters/post/DIL_ceFRSaO?xmt=AQGzP6YEYfaBIeGcCfCPBAdbaYzKzFc1ssoQWKVZNUujmw

Trump administration officials have told some US government employees that Elon Musk's DOGE team is using AI to surveil at least one federal agency's communications for hostility to Trump and his agenda, two people with knowledge of the matter said https://reut.rs/443eKWL

mickeyrat

https://www.threads.net/@democracydocket/post/DIJXAL3RZ9B?xmt=AQGz0PN8L0LJvTP7D9AW8xKts_Wh0fEHVJcqlyvhjid5PQ

"While Trump retains the ceremonial position of Head of State, signing executive orders with flourish and basking in symbolic pageantry, Musk has effectively become Head of Government, wielding unprecedented control over federal agencies." https://www.democracydocket.com/opinion/the-false-prophet-of-government-efficiency/

tempo_n_groove

mickeyrat said:

https://www.threads.net/@reuters/post/DIL_ceFRSaO?xmt=AQGzP6YEYfaBIeGcCfCPBAdbaYzKzFc1ssoQWKVZNUujmw

Trump administration officials have told some US government employees that Elon Musk's DOGE team is using AI to surveil at least one federal agency's communications for hostility to Trump and his agenda, two people with knowledge of the matter said https://reut.rs/443eKWL

"Next thing you know, they'll take my thoughts away!"

Dave Mustaine 1989.

mickeyrat

https://www.threads.net/@courtfurey/post/DIKOhdXp95C?xmt=AQGzdzzYPsV-YOfXkTCXOtAh7r7dBE_-HLrbyplV6pfNCw

So Musk’s proposed IRS DOGE hackathon has really just thrown me for a total f*cking Cybersecurity loop. We know that DOGE launched a government site so insecure, it was hacked w/in 24 hours via open API endpoints. Now, Musk wants to build a “Monster API” for the IRS that centralizes access to all taxpayer data. So…basically, same crew, same lack of security protocols, but even higher stakes. What could go wrong? Let me tell you, from a Cybersecurity standpoint. (🧵1/5)

mickeyrat

ProPublica’s investigative reporters rely on a careful playbook for finding waste, fraud and abuse within government agencies.

It bears little resemblance to the approach deployed by DOGE against the Social Security Administration or USAID.

Read more: https://propub.li/3FRRjpg

mickeyrat

The White House and DOGE have sought to eliminate thousands of jobs from the Forest Service. The wildland firefighting force is one of many targets within the agency.
https://propub.li/3G1G65j

mickeyrat

https://www.threads.net/@keithboykin/post/DIR1152T49b?xmt=AQGz-QkhA9bf_HkLURm7pu7sxLZrKyYZTlSIJ437Cb7fKA

Two planes collided on the ground at Washington National Airport today with members of Congress on board.