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Category: Law/Crime

How Elon Musk carried out an electronic coup and seized control of the U.S. government

How Elon Musk carried out an electronic coup and seized control of the U.S. government

The New York Times reports: Trump had announced the Department of Government Efficiency on Nov. 12 as an entity outside of government, but Mr. Musk quickly began to see problems with that — including the fact that it could be subject to public-record rules. He was also intent on getting access to federal data and payment systems. He felt that if he could not, the whole endeavor would be a waste of his time. Several people involved in the talks…

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Judge Alsup blocks mass firings of federal workers. Judge Bates orders sworn testimony from DOGE officials

Judge Alsup blocks mass firings of federal workers. Judge Bates orders sworn testimony from DOGE officials

The Washington Post reports: A federal judge on Thursday ordered the Office of Personnel Management to rescind directives that initiated the mass firing of probationary workers across the government, ruling that the terminations were probably illegal, as a group of labor unions argued in court. U.S. District Judge William Alsup ordered OPM to rescind its previous directives to more than two dozen agencies, including the Department of Defense, the Park Service, the Bureau of Land Management, the National Science Foundation…

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Musk’s ‘freelance henchmen’ in DOGE are one scam away from a national security emergency

Musk’s ‘freelance henchmen’ in DOGE are one scam away from a national security emergency

The Atlantic reports: [Elon Musk’s] major contribution, repeated to Trump and his advisers down at Mar-a-Lago, was to reject thinking about government as a lawyer would—a collection of institutions bound by norms, laws, and rules, and controlled by policy and decree. The bureaucracy does not easily bend to white papers. “The government runs on computers” soon became a mantra repeated by Trump’s advisers, who found themselves in awe of his enthusiasm and speed, even as they expressed annoyance at having…

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Trump administration sets out to create an America its people have never experienced − one without a meaningful government

Trump administration sets out to create an America its people have never experienced − one without a meaningful government

A worker removes letters from the U.S. Agency for International Development building. Kayla Bartkowski/Getty Images By Sidney Shapiro, Wake Forest University and Joseph P. Tomain, University of Cincinnati The U.S. government is attempting to dismantle itself. President Donald Trump has directed the executive branch to “significantly reduce the size of government.” That includes deep cuts in federal funding of scientific and medical research and freezing federal grants and loans for businesses. He has ordered the reversal or removal of regulations…

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$1.5 billion stolen from Bybit exchange in biggest crypto heist ever. Meanwhile, Argentina’s Milei under investigation

$1.5 billion stolen from Bybit exchange in biggest crypto heist ever. Meanwhile, Argentina’s Milei under investigation

Mashable reports: $1.5 billion. That’s the amount of money that has just been stolen by hackers from one of the world’s biggest crypto exchanges. On Friday, Ben Zhou, cofounder and CEO of the crypto exchange Bybit, shared that hackers had gained control of Bybit’s ETH (Ethereum) wallet and transferred all of its holdings to an unknown crypto wallet address. Bybit ETH multisig cold wallet just made a transfer to our warm wallet about 1 hr ago. It appears that this…

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As one federal judge issues temporary restraining order, another questions DOGE’s constitutionality

As one federal judge issues temporary restraining order, another questions DOGE’s constitutionality

HuffPost reports: A federal judge issued a temporary restraining order on Monday blocking certain agencies from sharing sensitive records with President Donald Trump’s so-called “Department of Government Efficiency,” or DOGE. Several labor unions filed a lawsuit earlier this month against the Education Department and the Office of Personnel Management to prevent them from forking over data to DOGE as it seeks to fire workers, end federal contracts and unilaterally close agencies. U.S. District Judge Deborah Boardman of Maryland said Monday…

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The U.S. Attorney for DC is not ‘President Trump’s lawyer,’ as Ed Martin now describes himself

The U.S. Attorney for DC is not ‘President Trump’s lawyer,’ as Ed Martin now describes himself

Rolling Stone reports: Interim U.S. Attorney Ed Martin has already vowed to operate as a legal attack dog for Elon Musk and DOGE, and is now styling himself and those in his office as President Donald Trump’s personal lawyers. “As President Trumps’ lawyers, we are proud to fight to protect his leadership as our President and we are vigilant in standing against entities like the AP that refuse to put America first,” Martin wrote in a post from the United…

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Neo-Nazi group plots rebuild as Kash Patel takes control of the FBI

Neo-Nazi group plots rebuild as Kash Patel takes control of the FBI

The Guardian reports: An international neo-Nazi terrorist group with origins in the US appears to be quickly rebuilding its global and stateside ranks, according to information obtained by the Guardian from its digital accounts. Founded in 2018, the Base has been the intense focus of a years-long FBI counter-terrorism investigation that has resulted in more than a dozen of its members arrested. It has plotted an assassination, mass shootings and other actions in Europe, which made it a proscribed terrorist…

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Key agencies, including some led by Trump loyalists, refuse to back Musk’s latest draconian demand

Key agencies, including some led by Trump loyalists, refuse to back Musk’s latest draconian demand

The Associated Press reports: Key U.S. agencies, including the FBI, State Department and the Pentagon, have instructed their employees not to comply with cost-cutting chief Elon Musk’s demand that federal workers explain what they accomplished last week — or risk losing their jobs. That resistance has intensified a pervasive sense of chaos and confusion, while highlighting a potential power struggle among President Donald Trump’s allies, that is affecting federal employees across the country as a new workweek is about to…

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Trump administration’s mass firings could leave federal government with ‘monumental’ bill, say experts

Trump administration’s mass firings could leave federal government with ‘monumental’ bill, say experts

The Guardian reports: Donald Trump’s administration could rack up a “monumental” bill and is breaking the law by firing government workers on spurious grounds, according to a top labor lawyer. Officials have cited “poor performance” when terminating thousands of federal workers. In many cases it’s not true, according to employees embroiled in the blitz, many of whom are now seeking legal advice. Jacob Malcom was acting deputy assistant secretary for policy and environmental management, and director of the office of…

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DOGE operative given access to Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency

DOGE operative given access to Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency

Nextgov/FCW reports: Edward Coristine, a 19-year-old staffer in billionaire Elon Musk’s Department of Government Efficiency with a reported history of interacting with hacking groups, has been given physical access to building facilities at the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency. Coristine is listed with a DHS email address and has been seen inside CISA, according to a person familiar with the matter and a directory image viewed by Nextgov/FCW. It is not clear what systems he had access to. CISA and…

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Trump once championed hiring of military spouses. Now they are getting fired

Trump once championed hiring of military spouses. Now they are getting fired

CNN reports: The Trump administration’s swift, sweeping cuts to the federal workforce is set to derail the livelihoods of potentially thousands of military families. The turmoil within the military community caused by the recent firings of probationary employees, looming terminations and a rolling series of deadlines for federal employees to return to work should not be surprising. For decades now, the federal government has marketed itself as the employer of choice for military spouses, who are unemployed at five times…

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DOGE’s millions: As Musk and Trump gut government, their ax-cutting agency gets cash infusion

DOGE’s millions: As Musk and Trump gut government, their ax-cutting agency gets cash infusion

By Avi Asher-Schapiro, Andy Kroll and Christopher Bing This story was originally published by ProPublica While Elon Musk and his underlings demand budget cuts and layoffs across the federal government, funding for their agency — the Department of Government Efficiency — has soared to nearly $40 million, ProPublica found in a review of Office of Management and Budget records. Billionaire investor Musk has called DOGE “maximally transparent.” President Donald Trump has said that some 100 people work for the group,…

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The DOGE sysadmins alone know what they are doing

The DOGE sysadmins alone know what they are doing

Zeynep Tufekci writes: [Thomas Jefferson] feared that an elected authoritarian would not just pulverize the institutions meant to limit his power, but take them over to wield as weapons, thus further entrenching himself. Even Jefferson couldn’t have imagined a future in which the arsenal being deployed included centralized databases with comprehensive records on every citizen’s employment, finances, taxes and for some, even health status. After a judge blocked a Trump executive order, Elon Musk shared a post with his more…

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How aspiring strongmen consolidate power: Fire civil servants; dismantle government departments

How aspiring strongmen consolidate power: Fire civil servants; dismantle government departments

A leader bent on expanding his own power would see the government’s bureaucracy as a key target. Andry Djumantara – iStock/Getty Images Plus By Erica Frantz, Michigan State University; Andrea Kendall-Taylor, Yale University, and Joe Wright, Penn State With the recent confirmations of Tulsi Gabbard and Robert F. Kennedy Jr. – two of the most controversial of President Donald Trump’s high-level administration nominees – the president’s attempt to remake government as a home for political loyalists continues. Soon after coming…

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