Sunday, February 2, 2025

This is why you have a bureaucracy

 I hope that you didn't miss this weekend the news that Elon Musk and those working for/with him have gained access to the U.S. Treasury payment system

From CNN

Before Trump’s inauguration, members of his transition landing team wanted to know granular details about the bureau’s proprietary computer systems, including “each step in the disbursement process.” They also wanted to visit field offices where government workers, in Philadelphia or Kansas, work on computers that disburse payments.

The requests puzzled many career officials initially. The transition operation hadn’t requested substantive briefings on any of Treasury’s other critical areas of operation, multiple people familiar with the matter said. Veterans of past transition efforts, representing presidents of both parties, couldn’t recall precedent for the Trump team’s entreaty.

That group wanted to know how to stop particular payments, and were told, by then-Acting Secretary of the Treasury David Lebryk "we don't do that." 

And let's stop for a moment and acknowledge that THIS is what is needed here. Thanks to Mr. Lebryk, as well as the officials described below at USAID, for doing so. 

With Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent sworn in this week, he granted Musk and his crew such access. Lebryk was placed on leave and then retired; he had been with the Treasury for three decades. 

The NY Intelligencer gathers a lot of reporting here, wins on the grabber headline: 

and sums this up as: 

So now Musk and DOGE have access to and potentially power over what is basically America’s checkbook, weeks before another debt ceiling crisis looms, at a time when Musk is vowing to somehow cut a hysterically large amount of federal spending, and during a chaotic period in which he and other officials in the Trump administration are running roughshod across the federal government like they have unchecked power.

And here's a gift link to the Wall Street Journal, which also covers a standoff at USAID

The thing that I am struggling to wrap my head around is this: so-called "DOGE" is only a federal entity by executive order. These are not federal employees, it appears with paychecks who have filled out requisite tax forms; they do not have background checks or clearances for such access. Musk, for sure, has a massive conflict of interest in doing anything anywhere near the federal government.

If what, per Wired, was happening this week at the Technology Transformation Services (part of the General Services Administration) is anything to go by, they may not have government worker I.D.s  or email addresses. 

I would have thought that it would have taken a number of steps--not just the yes or no of the top official--for anyone to be cleared to have access to the actual payment system of the United States government. 

Your average Massachusetts public school employee goes through more than this, by a lot. Having lots of steps to go through with more than one person involved is how we do things like keep public spending ethically.

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