from the spidermen-pointing-at-each-other-but-only-one-is-real dept
In a brazen try and keep away from oversight, Elon Musk’s DOGE workforce is now making an attempt to “audit” the very company tasked with auditing them. On Friday, NOTUS reported that DOGE officials showed up at the Government Accountability Office — Congress’s unbiased watchdog — to aim their signature hostile takeover routine. There’s only one small drawback: DOGE has no authority by any means over the legislative department.
This newest overreach comes after months of DOGE trying to place itself as some form of revolutionary authorities auditor — regardless of missing the experience or course of data that precise auditing requires. As we’ve coated earlier than, every thing DOGE claims to be doing was already being dealt with by expert professionals inside authorities — professionals whom Musk promptly fired, just like the technical specialists at 18F. Actual authorities auditors have been watching in horror as DOGE has been doing the opposite of correct auditing procedures.
The GAO’s investigation of DOGE has been constructing for months. For many years, the workplace has earned bipartisan respect for its methodical, nonpartisan audits of presidency operations. So when experiences emerged in April that Congress’s watchdog had begun examining DOGE’s activities, it advised critical considerations about DOGE’s operations. The GAO requested complete documentation about techniques entry, threat assessments, and potential misuse of company information.
Data present that the GAO—an unbiased auditing, analysis, and investigative company for Congress—seems to be requesting complete data from the companies in query, together with incident experiences on “potential or precise misuse of company techniques or information” and documentation of insurance policies and procedures referring to techniques DOGE operatives have accessed, in addition to documentation of insurance policies for the company’s threat assessments, audit logs, insider risk applications, and extra.
Simply final week, whereas DOGE was busy slashing budgets with out understanding the results, the GAO demonstrated what precise authorities effectivity seems to be like. The workplace identified over $100 million in potential IT savings — actual price reductions discovered by cautious evaluation of redundant techniques and pointless investments, not arbitrary cuts.
Price-trimming within the US federal authorities is all the fashion proper now – and a brand new report finds greater than $100 million in financial savings accessible to the Feds by doing nothing however eliminating redundant and pointless IT investments.
These financial savings are a part of a way more important $100 billion in potential price reductions advisable by Uncle Sam’s Authorities Accountability Workplace (GAO), as detailed within the auditors’ fifteenth annual “fragmentation, overlap, and duplication” report, launched this week. The annual federal finances is about $7 trillion complete, for reference.
The distinction between GAO’s methodical strategy and DOGE’s slash-and-burn techniques couldn’t be clearer.
The Register’s reporting highlighted an uncomfortable fact for DOGE supporters: when requested about DOGE’s position, GAO director Lucas-Judy diplomatically famous that whereas they’re “at all times comfortable if different teams need to implement our suggestions,” DOGE has largely ignored GAO’s present work — besides when cherry-picking suggestions that align with their predetermined cuts.
Reasonably than have interaction constructively with GAO’s findings, DOGE responded by trying to claim management over the congressional watchdog itself. This transfer isn’t simply inappropriate — it’s clearly unconstitutional. If DOGE has any authority in any respect (which a number of ongoing lawsuits dispute), it might be restricted to government department companies. But right here they’re, trying to increase their attain into Congress’s unbiased oversight arm.
Elon Musk’s DOGE workforce is now beginning to goal authorities companies exterior of the manager department, notifying the U.S. Authorities Accountability Workplace — the congressional watchdog that performs research for legislators about federal waste, fraud and abuse — that it has “assigned a workforce” to assail that company, in accordance with an inside e mail obtained by NOTUS.
The GAO’s response was appropriately direct. In an inside e mail obtained by NOTUS, the workplace knowledgeable its workers that it had “despatched a letter to the performing administrator of DOGE stating that GAO is a legislative department company that conducts work for the Congress. As such, we’re not topic to DOGE or government orders.” The workplace additionally notified congressional committees about DOGE’s tried overreach.
This confrontation exposes two crucial points: first, DOGE’s constitutional illiteracy in trying to claim government department authority over a congressional company. Second, and maybe extra troubling, it reveals DOGE’s obvious technique of making an attempt to neutralize any significant oversight of its personal actions.
Given Musk’s monitor report of lashing out when instructed “no,” this case is prone to escalate. However the actual story right here isn’t nearly DOGE’s continued incompetence — it’s about their more and more determined makes an attempt to keep away from precise accountability whereas masquerading as authorities watchdogs themselves.
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