A powerful US senator has confirmed that Elon Musk's team, which will join the Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE), will gain access to the federal payment system, while simultaneously gaining access to the confidential personal data of millions of Americans, as well as the data of government contractors who directly compete with Musk's own business.
This was stated by Ron Wyden, a Democratic Senator from Oregon and a leading member of the Senate Finance Committee, on the social network Bluesky.
Musk has gained access to the US Treasury database
Wyden says his sources have confirmed that a highly sensitive Treasury database has been opened to the tech billionaire and his team.
Now Watching
Donald Trump's new Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent has given the DOGE billionaire's team “full access to the system”.
Wyden added that the data includes “social and medicare payments, grants, payments to government contractors… All of this”.
According to The Guardian, the confirmation of the deal means Musk, the richest man in the world, will now have access to one of the US government's most sensitive databases. The system controls more than $6 trillion in federal cash flow each year, and millions of Americans rely on it for Social Security, Medicare, federal paychecks and more.
Until now, the information stored in the database was extremely carefully protected, with only a few select officials having access to it. But with the Trump administration taking office on January 20, members of Musk's team have been fighting to gain access.
On Friday, the Washington Post reported that the Treasury Department's top civil servant has resigned after more than 30 years on the job. David Lebryk had clashed with Musk's associates over their attempts to effectively hack the system.
According to the New York Times, Lebryk was placed on administrative leave after he opposed giving DOGE agents access. The newspaper reports that new Treasury Secretary Bessent gave the go-ahead for the new deal late Friday.
Under the deal, the Times reports, one of the DOGE members who can now view the data of millions of Americans is Tom Krause, the chief executive of tech company Cloud Software Group.
Before confirming the deal, Wyden had already sounded the alarm about Musk's attempts to hack such a sensitive federal database. On Friday, he wrote to Bessent, warning that the system was so critical that “it simply couldn't fail.”.
Wyden warned that “any politically motivated tampering with them risks causing serious damage to our country and our economy. I don't see any compelling reason why political operatives who have demonstrated a blatant disregard for the law would need access to these sensitive, mission-critical systems.”.
One concern about giving Elon Musk's entity access to the system is that he could use it to block payments for a wide range of federal programs as part of his mission to break and burn the U.S. government. Wyden also suggested that the move could pose a national security risk given Musk's extensive business interests in China, which in turn could give Chinese intelligence agencies access to U.S. data.
This “endangers U.S. cybersecurity and creates a conflict of interest that makes (Musk, — Ed.) access to these systems a national security risk, Wyden concluded.
