U.S. Treasury Department Hands Over Federal Payment System Access to Musk Team

The Treasury Department, headed by newly appointed Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent, has essentially handed over the government checkbook to Elon Musk and his team of lackeys from DOGE.

The Treasury’s payment system has been a closely held operation run by career officials, with a limited number of people authorized to access the information. It contains sensitive information about hundreds of millions of Americans.

The career official who previously oversaw it, David Lebryk, was placed on administrative leave last week after he resisted DOGE’S access.

Writing to Bessent,  Sen. Ron Wyden, the ranking Democrat on the Senate Finance Committee, said that any “politically-motivated meddling” in the payment systems “risks severe damage to our country and the economy.”

Sen. Elizabeth Warren also sent a letter to Bessent on Monday demanding answers on why Musk and DOGE were granted access to the federal checkbook, which could be used to track and potentially limit government spending.

“It is extraordinarily dangerous to meddle with the critical systems that process trillions of dollars of transactions each year, are essential to preventing a default on federal debt, and ensure that tens of millions of Americans receive their Social Security checks, tax refunds and Medicare benefits,” Sen. Warren wrote.

Trump has no idea whatsoever what Musk is actually doing even though he also signed the executive order giving DOGE “full and prompt access to all unclassified agency records, software systems, and IT systems."

Kara Swisher (@karaswisher.bsky.social) 2025-02-03T08:55:51.006Z

Treasury’s payment system processes more than $5 trillion annually, paying the countries bills. This includes Social Security checks and tax refunds, which means the system includes sensitive personal information on tens of millions of Americans. A Sunday headline from New York Magazine, “Elon Musk May Have Your Social Security Number,” is not an exaggeration.

Fitch and everyone else should downgrade U.S. credit. If a bill gets paid only if Elon Musk or Donald Trump feels like it, then the U.S. is not very creditworthy.

Dean Baker (@deanbaker13.bsky.social) 2025-02-02T15:48:46.846Z

According to reporting in Politico, the Doge team doesn’t have the capability to withhold or change payments—at least not yet. Instead, access by Doge’s Treasury representative, software executive Tom Krause, is “read-only.” But warning signs of a hostile takeover have been flashing. For example, Musk’s team literally took over Office of Personnel Management computer systems this past week, locking OPM officials out of them. They have been taking down entire government websites and datasets, causing public-facing information and research to disappear before Americans’ eyes in Orwellian fashion. And over the weekend, Doge representatives demanded classified information from USAID that they lacked clearances for, according to CNN, despite that the executive order creating Doge explicitly exempts classified information from its efforts. When USAID security officials refused to comply, they were put on leave. — Mother Jones

There is bipartisan support to cut red tape and make the government better. But that doesn’t involve giving an unelected billionaire complete control. DOGE is not a government agency and Elon is not a government employee or appointee.Is the GOP just a bunch of lemmings?

Daniel Goldman (@danielsgoldman.dg4ny.co) 2025-02-03T12:36:58.550Z

Forbes writes:

Now, as fears emerge Trump’s administration is “dangerously” undermining the U.S. dollar, Musk has confirmed he wants to put the U.S. Treasury on a blockchain, the technology that underpins bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies—including Musk’s pet project dogecoin.

Knowing the names of the an unelected oligarch’s underlings who are destroying the government from within is a crime now, apparently.

MeidasTouch (@meidastouch.com) 2025-02-03T13:32:31.747Z