Yes, DOGE was stealing your private data and giving it to right-wing groups
Now we need to determine the extent of the damage -- and get ready for fights in the courts and in Congress.
This is what Cassandra must have felt like — and let’s be clear, it’s exhausting.
A year ago when Elon Musk was running around with a chainsaw and hijacking Oval Office pressers and wearing tech bro clothes to Cabinet meetings, there was a clear sense that the so-called “DOGE” had a more sinister purpose of accessing the motherlode of federal government data and using it for private gain.
And lo and behold, now we’re beginning to see evidence of exactly that.
Two of Musk’s minions lodged like hookworms inside the Social Security Administration (SSA) — i.e. the agency that truly has all the data on everyone — were in cahoots with an unnamed “political advocacy group” that was aiming to challenge overturn election results, so they could match up Social Security data with voter data. Data was siphoned out of government systems into private, third-party, unapproved servers. At least some data was accessed by non-government parties, but we do not know how much. SSA discovered this happened, and they referred the matter to DOJ.
And how do we know this? Because DOJ felt compelled to confess to it in a court filing. Which likely means that it was going to be revealed in documents they had to produce in discovery.
This is just the part we know about thus far. If DOJ is admitting to this, there is a disturbingly high probability that there is far more evidence of this kind of data theft and misappropriation that has yet to be revealed.
Now let’s review the list of things that likely will not happen.
The data thieves will likely not be prosecuted by DOJ; the matter will be “taken under consideration” and given roughly the same consideration that DOJ is giving to the Epstein files, which is to say, their mission is to sweep everything under the rug and to run out the clock until the statutes of limitation expire, all relevant parties are deceased, or until the heat death of the universe.
I would also not be placing too much stock in the notion that Republicans in Congress will do anything about this. Even the ones who do not like Musk would prefer not to face a primary opponent juiced up with Musk’s money.
Legacy media outlets are not going to be turning this into the scandal that it should be. Not when the outlet that brought you Woodward and Bernstein is now owned by a multi-billionaire who spent $40 million to buy a hagiodocumentary of the first lady in order to butter dear Mango Mussolini. World-class journalists may try to dig into this story, and they may even succeed, but if management buries the story on page Q82 or in a D-block at 2:47am, then the tree will fall in the forest to an audience of three.
Where does this leave us? For one thing, it may end up being possible for citizens to sue the government and the Musk minions for this data theft. The Privacy Act of 1974 provides a “private right of action” that allows individuals to sue for unauthorized disclosure of their records. The good news is that there is now clear evidence of a willful, intentional disclosure of government records. The bad news is that any plaintiffs will also have to prove that the disclosure actually caused them harm.
Yet in a way, that is not actually the point. This is not just about money. This is about discovering the truth of what happened and shining the brightest of lights on it. Even if plaintiffs in such a case only recovered the most modest of damages — saying that there was some harm done by the mere fact that their personal and financial data made it out of a government system and into a private server — the real victory would be learning what happened, who did it, who else was involved, and the extent of DOGE data theft throughout the government.
In other words, a case could now likely be brought regarding the data theft we know about — but through the discovery phase of the case, with all its document requests, interrogatories, subpoenas, and depositions, the case could expand into an inquiry about other data breaches, both at SSA and at other agencies.
Finally, of course, there is the enticing possibility that a Democratic majority in the House could result in congressional investigations into DOGE misconduct. Again, the revelation regarding SSA provides more than enough probable cause to justify a sweeping set of subpoenas into DOGE’s data practices, ties to outside organizations, use of outside data servers, all of it.
As if we needed yet another reason to fight like hell for victory in the midterms.
Musk belongs in a prison cell.
I believe this data is being used to create votes. If you have all the data, you control the narrative. I believe they will use it to manipulate votes.