Elon Musk, the tech billionaire and unelected adviser to President Donald Trump, is asserting control over much of the federal bureaucracy and sensitive government computer systems despite lacking clear authority. The highest-ranking career official at the Treasury Department was pushed out after refusing to hand Musk’s team the keys to the government’s entire payment system and the $6 trillion in payments the system processes annually, including Social Security checks, tax refunds and Medicare benefits. Musk and his team have also seized control at the Office of Personnel Management and the General Services Administration, key institutions that function as the central nervous system of the U.S. government. “In any other situation, this would be called state capture, and people around the world would be condemning it,” says Democratic strategist Waleed Shahid, who writes in a new blog post that Elon Musk is staging a coup. We also speak with Lindsay Owens, executive director of the Groundwork Collaborative, who warns that Musk could be laying the groundwork for major tax cuts Republicans have promised that will disproportionately benefit corporations and wealthy people like him. “Elon Musk is going to pay for his tax cut with your Social Security,” says Owens.
Are there no drug tests for political advisors or something?
I’d have expected this for a position with much power - just like in the military.
Or am I that far off here from reality?
Musk has no clearance, wasn’t voted in, is uncredentialed, and unqualified.
The fact that the government is just sitting back and allowing this is disgusting.
All of it to line their pockets with what will be akin to monopoly money once they destroy the country.
People that rich have reserves in other currencies and precious metals. They don’t really give a shit if the US dollar crashes.
They fired a bunch of FBI and DoJ, so if they’re sitting back it’s because they’re unemployed.
They’re why they’re so gung ho about crypto. They want to make everyone’s money worthless while they hoard all the gold themselves.
That’s exactly what I don’t understand
There are safe guards for exactly that shit in law (at least I think/hope so), but seemingly no one has the guts to step up
But I have to admit, that I don’t know the American laws at all, and with that don’t know what their actual options are
Musk doesn’t hold any official position.
So, how can he even do all that shit and the organisations don’t just tell him to go choke on a dick?
If they push back, that person gets fired and replaced by a toady who won’t.
Yeah, talk about a hard place and a rock…
Fucking sucks, that there is seemingly no leverage against those idiots
Well. None that are within the rules.
Mostly because it’s so brazen and fucking insane that people don’t even know what to do about it. If someone walked into your office building while waving a knife around and shouted, “get the fuck out or I’m gonna start stabbing people!” what do you think you’d do?
My guess is that everyone is going to run out because we’ve been engrained to recognize the mechanisms in place to prevent and protect from these types of things. Anyone thinking anything other than getting the fuck out would probably be thinking “it’s not worth it, let the police handle it.”
Let’s say you start shouting, “that’s illegal, go choke on a dick! C’mon y’all, there’s only one of him and many of us; we can’t wait for the police, ACAB!!!” I’d probably commend you when I read the article or your obituary, but everyone else in the office is going to be concerned with saving themselves and letting whatever contingencies kick in.
Everyone with the power to stop this is sitting on their hands while waiting for someone else to step up. And we, the people? We’ve been trampled and subjugated for so long that now that we’re being told to rise up, we don’t know how. “Rise up against the system you helped manufacture? How? Y’all arrest and kill us in droves just for threatening money, much less people in power.”
It’s pretty simple: shoot him in the face.
This 100%. Violence is the only language that gets through at this point.
Although this article I read a few days ago focuses on protests, it somehow resembles this situation imho
https://crimethinc.com/2025/01/28/its-safer-in-the-front-taking-the-offensive-against-tyranny
If you always just duck down to survive, they’ll just feel confirmed and encouraged.
Every bit of resistance costs them time and money, and signals to the rest, that there is another way, than to just buckle down
Not an American, but my guess is that they would have to sue and then discover that the judges are all toeing the party line.
Yeah, the last years seemingly were a build up to let Trump live his dictator dream
Must be nice to have no idea what’s been going on.
Because I asked about a detail of how a foreign country runs their government?
Sadly I do get all the shit news. I mostly wonder how this is even possible to happen in a normal state with functioning jurisdiction
I was serious. I’d like to not know any of this insanity
Ah, gotcha.
Thought you’re accusing me of not knowing anything, because I asked a question.
Get your sentiment though…
Some Americans forget there are other countries. It’s unavoidable until education improves.