The exposure and reform of the Deep State is the goal, and speed is of the essence
The USAID was somewhat of a warmup.
DOGE has also turned its spotlight on the Treasury Department, which makes perfect sense if you’re trying to figure out where the money gets spent and where it gets wasted. A federal judge of the leftist variety has temporarily blocked their efforts:
In an egregious and unconstitutional assault on executive authority, Judge Paul Engelmayer has unilaterally forbidden all of Trump’s political appointees—including Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent—from accessing Treasury Department data. This ruling, concocted without legal precedent or constitutional justification, is nothing short of judicial sabotage. Worse, it was issued ex parte—meaning Trump administration lawyers weren’t given notice, weren’t allowed to argue, and weren’t even in the room. Only Democrat attorneys general were heard, ensuring a predetermined outcome.
Engelmayer’s order is legally indefensible. He cites no statutory basis because none exists. He offers no constitutional rationale because the Constitution directly contradicts him. Instead, he fabricates a fiction: that the duly appointed Treasury Secretary is nothing more than a ceremonial figurehead, akin to a powerless monarch, while unelected bureaucrats—who answer to no voters—control the nation’s finances. This is judicial tyranny masquerading as jurisprudence.
The implications are staggering. By stripping the executive branch of access to its own financial data, this ruling effectively transfers control of the federal purse to the permanent bureaucracy—the so-called “deep state.” That is a direct assault on the Constitution’s separation of powers, which vests executive authority in the elected President and his appointees, not in career government employees.
This is lawfare at its most brazen: a raw, partisan power grab dressed up in legalese. If allowed to stand, this decision sets the precedent that any left-wing judge can unilaterally strip the President of his authority and hand it to the administrative state. That is not democracy. It is not law. It is judicial dictatorship.
It’s only for a week, but that doesn’t mean it wouldn’t be extended. It’s at the very least a delaying tactic, and of course the administration is challenging it:
In an Emergency Motion to Dissolve the TRO, filed early this morning, the Trump administration demonstrates not just the legal impropriety of the Judicial Branch removing political control from the Executive Branch, but also that there was no widespread access by political appointees. The Emergency Motion only addresses the removal of authority from political appointees, the underlying merits will be addressed in papers in opposition to the plaintiffs’ overall motion. …
There was no emergency. There was no threat to personal information. There was none of the drama the plaintiffs’ motion papers invoked and the emergency duty judge used to justify the political interference by the judiciary in the functioning of the Treasury Department.
So far, one of the major Treasury Department problems revealed is the extent of the department’s failure to address fraud:
… in a Saturday post on X, [Musk] wrote:
Yesterday, I was told that there are currently over $100B/year of entitlements payments to individuals with no SSN or even a temporary ID number. If accurate, this is extremely suspicious.
When I asked if anyone at Treasury had a rough guess for what percentage of that number is unequivocal and obvious fraud, the consensus in the room was about half, so $50B/year or $1B/week!! This is utterly insane and must be addressed immediately.
What was being done about it? Very little, apparently; here’s Musk’s explanation of the reason for that:
Nobody in Treasury management cared enough before. I do want to credit the working-level people in the Treasury who have wanted to do this for many years but have been stopped by prior management.
Everything at Treasury was geared towards complaint minimization. People [who] receive money don’t complain, but people who don’t receive money (especially fraudsters) complain very loudly, so the fraud was allowed to continue.
That makes a certain amount of twisted sense. The focus was not on saving money for the taxpayer. The focus was on the smooth running of the department, and so the path of least resistance was chosen.
Musk said that the Treasury Department has agreed to require a payment categorization code (which helps with audits), a rationale for the payment, and a do-not-pay list of entities found to be fraudulent. These are so basic as to be – one would think – no-brainers. But apparently they are new policies.
And then there’s also this article, explaining some of the workings of DOGE. If true – and I think it’s mostly true, anyway – it’s fascinating:
The following is about plans that were made prior to the election
While media focused on campaign rallies and political theater, a quiet army was being assembled. In offices across DC, veteran strategists mapped the administrative state’s pressure points. Think tanks developed action plans for every agency. Policy institutes trained rapid deployment teams. Former appointees shared battlefield intelligence from previous administrations’ failures.
By Inauguration Day, over 1,000 pre-vetted personnel stood ready—each armed with clear objectives, mapped legal authorities, and direct lines to support networks. This wasn’t just staffing; it was a battle plan decades in the making.
Not your father’s GOP.
More:
The secret wasn’t just speed—it was precision. Instead of waiting for Senate confirmations, the transition team prioritized non-Senate-confirmed positions. …
This urgency drove innovation. When DOGE’s young coders breached Treasury’s payment systems, pre-positioned legal teams neutralized resistance within hours. When career officials tried revoking system access, they discovered DOGE’s authority came from levels they couldn’t challenge. When leaks surfaced, rapid-response units fed counter-narratives to alternative media almost instantly.
There was a reason USAID was targeted early:
Created by Executive Order in 1961, USAID could be dissolved with a single presidential signature. No congressional approval needed. No court challenges possible. Just one pen stroke, and six decades of carefully constructed financial networks would face sunlight. …
EPA climate initiatives? Not just mapped—found unauthorized programs in 47 states. Education’s DEI maze? Not just exposed—revealed coordination across 1,200 programs. Intelligence community black budgets? Not just traced—uncovered patterns hidden for 30 years.
“The administrative state runs on two things,” a senior advisor explained, watching patterns emerge across DOGE’s screens. “Control of information and money flows.” His eyes tracked new connections forming in real-time. “We’re not just exposing their networks—we’re rewriting their DNA.”
They bureaucrats have gotten very very used to secrecy and consider it their right. So to them, DOGE’s investigations are terrible terrible violations that threaten all their work. Of course, the fact that USAID exists at the whim of the executive is forgotten.
More:
For the permanent bureaucracy, this wasn’t just change. It was an extinction-level event. Their power came from controlling who got paid, when they got paid, and what they got paid for. Now those controls were evaporating like dawn burning away darkness.
The pattern was devastating in its simplicity:
(1) Map the money flows
(2) Deploy aligned personnel
(3) Expose the networks
(4) Restructure the systems
There’s much much more at the link. According to the article, one of the side effects has been the unleashing of money for some local projects that had previously been stalled by red tape.
As the ever-eloquent President Biden would say, all of this seems like a big F***ing deal.
[ADDENDUM: More lawfare against Trump here.]
None of the EKO “article” is true. It is fiction posted by a writer of fiction on a fiction substack, full of works of fiction such as:
“The Fall of Eden: A Love Story that Transformed Humanity”
“The Lucifer Rebellion: A Story of Light, Shadow, and Earth’s Extraordinary Destiny”
“The Lost Years: Jesus in India”
I can see why people enjoy reading it, but I am hugely disturbed at how many are taking it as fact, when a couple of clicks would suffice to show that it is fiction:
Quite a few people have wasted time trying to confirm any of the details in it, and have been unable to.
Niketas:
It seems mixed to me. That’s why I hedged. The hyperbole is the problem. But other things conform to my perceptions: the advance preparations, the speed, the fraud exposure. What about that part is fiction? That part seems merely descriptive. That’s what I focused on.
I hope these preposterous TROs will be swept away soon. Really, arguing that the Chief Executive, elected by the constitutional process, and his deputies may not access information about how the government spends money is unbelievably crazy.
Beautifully and thoroughly lain out there, neo. And as the quip goes, anybody else feel the urge for a cigarette?
In fact EKO already has a sequel up incorporating the last couple of days’ online news, called “The Machine Fights Back”.
@neo:What about that part is fiction? That part seems merely descriptive.
EKO is just writing fiction based on what he/she/it is reading online, and people are taking it for a sort of journalistic account based on having done interviews or been present or some such.
I could write a stirring first-person fictional account of your week’s battle with the bots, based on what you’ve posted here, and I wouldn’t be telling any lies or contradicting you in any way, but it would nonetheless be fiction.
Just like this other bit by EKO:
Jesus COULD have visited India by way of Ur. There really were astronomers in Ur. But it’s fiction.
NIketas:
That doesn’t make it fiction. Actually, it makes it like a blog post. I just base what I write on what I read, but I try to base it on truth. My track record is pretty good, too.
To me it didn’t seem like he had his own special sources, just that he was doing exactly that: writing a colorful account of what’s going on, based on stuff in the public domain. I didn’t fact-check everything he wrote, but it doesn’t seem like fiction except for predictions or hyperbole. I repeat: what about it is fiction? That is, what is false?
I basically do what EKO did, although my style tends to be dry. That doesn’t make it fiction. By the way, I’ve also written fiction: short stories, for example. But that’s not what I do here. And I don’t think EKO is writing fiction of that kind when he writes that article. Maybe we’re quibbling over the word “fiction,” but it means something, and that something is not what I do here or what I think EKO is doing there.
Neo did include the caveat, “If true – and I think it’s mostly true, anyway – it’s fascinating.”
Quotes that were attributed, to JD Vance and Troup Hemenway are accurate, though other quotes, including a crying EPA official are likely projection.
This is the kind of story you’d find in Rolling Stone, or The Atlantic– stories that are based on events with embellishments to increase their effect.
EKO includes events where long stalled projects are suddenly completed, likely didn’t happen– but may become reality when much of the graft/waste is stripped from the government and the bureaucracy becomes for responsive.
In fact he says:
It’s certainly a stirring account– but are the DOGE boys really housed in a basement office in the Treasury building as the story claims?
They are working out of offices in the Treasury Dept. and I suppose it could be the basement. If that could be verified, it would actually go a long way to verifying the account is from an insider.
Utterly eviscerate these rogue institutions ‘root and branch’ and then ‘salt the earth’.
Geez!? Excellent post – with perfect timing.
I’m avoiding EKO for the moment; however, informed readers should do more than just pick ‘n choose their sources (as many here seem to do).
Show me proof that EKO is only about “fiction” – since I am not going to dig into it this early.
There are “informed” readers and there are also INVESTIGATIVE readers, IMHO. Maybe EKO’s “fiction” is a mixture of BS ‘n Truth, so a investigative reader should determine which is which…so to speak.
BTW, nothing new about Jesus having spent years in India. In my research on the subject – there is no evidence of Jesus ever doing so.
(NOTE: is spell checker working?)
The Essenes – as a source for Jesus – is/are (?) another possibility. There is evidence of Jewish presence along trade routes between the Mediterranean and both India and China. I have noticed similarities in Christian thought and writings to Buddhism & some Hinduism texts. Similarities also between Buddhism & some Hinduism texts to Essenes and Christianity. Absolute proof – no. Then again:
Nope, sorry. I read the EKO article from a link by Mark Tapscott on Instapundit the other day, and instantly dismissed it as a fabrication. Mark is a nice fellow, but painfully naive, and the story simply stinks of fantasy without any sense of how things unfold in real time.
I spend a lot of time on X and quickly realized that many posters and their linked articles are deserving of the highest levels of skepticism. Sometimes they contain kernels of truth, often they are manipulative or simply preposterous.
The Right has a lot of grifters and weak characters creating content that outrages but does not inform. I have a list of people, many frequently followed and re-tweeted by the Right, who I hold in disdain and contempt. Some of them could even be psych ops of the Left and IC types.
Ed:
So what is false in his description of the speed and general drift of what’s happened? Obviously, some things like the crying staffer aren’t things he witnessed; I think that was obvious. But what elements of the basics – the things I quoted directly from the article – are false? It seems to me like a colorful summary of what appears to have happened, plus some possibly hyperbolic suggestions about the future.
@neo:So what is false in his description
Neo, you know that “fiction” and “falsehood” are not the same thing. If I write a novel about George Washington at Valley Forge, it would still be fiction even if there were no falsehoods in it.
Parts of EKO’s story are written from a future time looking back:
Where did all the dialogue come from?
And what about this:
Oh, wait, that’s from “THE LUCIFER REBELLION: A STORY OF LIGHT, SHADOW + EARTH’S EXTRAORDINARY DESTINY”, also by EKO. My mistake…
Neo, the algorithms and AI are capable, but the descriptions here were very generous. Directionally, yes, things are happening fast and some connections are being revealed, but government data systems are cobbled together with varying degrees of standardization and interactivity. This account is a dramatization that accelerates the timeline and exaggerates the analytical outcomes obtainable. GIGO, garbage in-garbage out still prevails, and many of the systems they are analyzing lack critical date elements and common standards.
Treasury system is primarily a payment processing domain, data passed to them for processing is deemed available for payment, and Treasury’s role is to ensure execution. Ideally they should be a point of verification as well as payment, but the parameters they have for verification are ludicrously limited. DOGE makes noise about that, but it’s a system design issue, not a compliance issue.
It’s possible that DOGE teams are among the sources of the psych op, hoping to instill fear and paralysis in the deep state forces. But there is much analysis and data linking yet to be done for DOGE to be able to paint the full picture, it is not unfolding in real time on the screens as portrayed in the article.
Like some said about Trump, the Dems and the press takes him literally, but not seriously, while MAGA takes him seriously, but not literally. Best not to fall into that trap ourselves.
Niketas:
Fiction must contain falsehoods. If a novel about George Washington contains only truth, it’s history rather than a novel.
As I said in my post, it seems the article is mostly true. The predictions are just predictions, however.
Ed:
The quotes from Musk do indicate it’s a system design issue and not a compliance issue, if I understand those terms correctly. DOGE has made suggestions for better ways to control fraud, and Treasury has said it will adopt them, at least, according to Musk.
USAID is another story, quite different.
Niketas:
I already said the dialogue was the part that was not witnessed. Almost certainly had to have been made up. But – as I already asked – what is false about the speed and general drift of what happened? I quoted it for that, and made it quite clear that I thought parts were not true.
I read the EKO post on Feb 5, and added it to my collection under the title ‘EKO’s Romantic Novel’. It just sounded like a narrative founded on a few facts, then embellished to suit the author.
Insufficienly sensitive:
And I agree the dialogue is imaginary, as well as the projections for the future. I’m still waiting to hear what’s false in the facts about DOGE’s methods, etc. it’s based on. That’s what I’m curious about.
Update from Margot Cleveland later today (h/t a commenter at LI)
https://x.com/ProfMJCleveland/status/1889011843374731554
Folks: This Court order purports to ban the Executive Branch from pausing any federal funding. The TRO was outrageous as originally issued, but this Order shreds Article II of the constitution.
Quote Margot Cleveland @ProfMJCleveland
BREAKING: Holy crapola! This federal judge went so far off the rails, Trump Administration really has no option but to seek mandamus! 1/
I agree with you Neo. When this first appeared at instapundit, a link was sent to my neighbor who is a reclusive ex-Silicon Valley techie – dropped out of UC after 2 years, went to work for a well known software company in Santa Clara, then burned out after 10 years. His take was almost identical to yours but with the opinion that the woman or man who wrote it is undoubtedly of Indian extraction and may have a contact inside Musk’s team. He said the description of a young coder with a laptop working furiously all night could have been him.
DOGE says that it has discovered that, just last week, FEMA sent a $59 million dollar payment to pay for New York city luxury hotel accommodations for illegal aliens, and that DOGE intends to try to “claw back” that payment; money which should have been used for disaster relief for US citizens.
The kicker, one of the major luxury hotels getting such payments is reportedly owned by Pakistan.
Under their seemingly benign surface, has every agency of the US government become twisted, corrupt?
Are any of these agencies carrying out their stated missions, and doing what they are supposed to be doing?
If you want to be truly shocked (and I was already pretty jaded on the corruption in the White House & Democratic party), go to YouTube and look up the podcast of Lindy Li on Shawn Ryan. She was a big-time Democratic fundraiser who has abandoned the Dems and is spilling the beans on the whole corrupt enterprise – and she names names…
Don’t miss it
Dr Bob
Hello. Part of me is a bit regretful at not having joined the new administration, or at least tried to. My current job has a bit of the mundane about it. Whether I could have measured up to the demands of helping in some small way to bring order to the Augean Stables on the Potomac… I probably don’t have the energy level that Trump & Co. are looking for.
While at least two DOGE team members have offices in the Dept. of Treasury, it’s reported that DOGE team members will be visiting Parkersburg, West Virginia, where they will gain read-only access to the U.S. government’s central accounting system, indicating their work extends beyond just the Treasury building in Washington, D.C.
Is this where the really money is?
What is “EKO”?
*sigh* For the nth time, the federal government is *not* a corporation, and neither Trump nor Elon seem to understand this. The head of the executive branch is *not* the CEO. The President can *not* shut down programs just because “I don’t like them.” or “This program was started by Senator Elizabeth Warren, and I hate her and call her Pocahontas isn’t that hilarious HAHAHA!”
They both need to learn what most American kids learn in grade school. Perhaps they should start with this.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pKSGyiT-o3o
BJ:
Nope, not nearly that simple.
Ace also has a post about the obviously unethical if not illegal TRO, and it’s a doozy.
He posts the screencap from a whiny would-be university student yearning to be a government apparatchik, and I draw your attention to her nom.
They are so clueless.
https://ace.mu.nu/archives/413610.php
What we are fundamentally dealing with.
https://accordingtohoyt.com/wp-content/uploads/2025/02/1730057996161802240.webp?w=825
And tying a few loose ends together.
https://accordingtohoyt.com/wp-content/uploads/2025/02/1731563258143318016.jpg?w=973
Not just winning, but winning bigly.
https://x.com/lampwright4/status/1886245768559812679
”The President can *not* shut down programs just because ‘I don’t like them.’”
In most cases he can. Nobody in Congress put a line item in the budget to spend $27 million on transgender dance therapy in Peru. That would have made things too obvious, and it would have been discovered and shut down years ago.
Instead Congress put a line item in the budget for up to $50 billion to improve human rights in foreign countries and let the permanent bureaucracy decide exactly what to spend it on. The Democrats in the bureaucracy then funded Democratic Party initiatives no matter who was president.
But the bureaucrats formally work for the president. He can order them to fund his priorities instead of their own, and he can fire them if they don’t. That’s what is happening now.
DOGE is discovering what the money is actually being spent on, not just what line item it falls under. That’s what makes it so dangerous to the Democrats.
Couldn’t happen to a more deserving mass serial killer.
https://notthebee.com/article/doge-axes-168000-anthony-fauci-shrine-at-nih-museum
If the Left can call for gun control after each incident, can we call for bureaucrat control now?
Decades ago I read a nonfiction book or two by Richard Marcinko, detailing his career in the U. S. Navy Seals. I got the impression that some of the “true stories” in the book(s) were actually fiction.
Later on, I read a novel he wrote, also about the Seals. It occurred to me that at least some of this “fiction” could have been factual, but he would have run afoul of the Navy’s disclosure rules if he labeled it nonfiction.
From the Pixels of Record:
https://babylonbee.com/news/soros-funded-judge-vows-to-keep-billionaire-influence-out-of-politics
https://babylonbee.com/news/democrats-uncover-devious-billionaire-plot-to-spend-billions-buying-social-media-company-to-get-president-trump-elected-in-order-to-access-the-treasury-database-and-steal-grandmas-695-social-
“…security check. … At publishing time, Democrats had warned Americans that if not stopped, Elon would potentially move on to more brazen crimes, like using other people’s social security numbers to apply for a Visa credit card.”
https://babylonbee.com/news/study-finds-people-trying-to-stop-financial-audit-have-absolutely-nothing-to-hide
The Dershowitz video is worth the time spent.
Some memorable quotes (as close as I could type them):
“The struggle for liberty never stays won,… the struggle for governance is never over.”
“This is NOT a Constitutional crisis! Going into the process of checks and balances is what is supposed to happen!”
His overall message is repeated at the end:
“Don’t simplify our complicated world; understand the complexity of our system of government.”