Federal workers stood by their decision to leak information about Elon Musk to the media following his threats to prosecute whistleblowers.
Their defiance follows Musk’s stark warning that Pentagon officials who leak would be prosecuted after reports that he was scheduled to receive a briefing Friday about the U.S. military’s top-secret war plans for China.
The DOGE mogul claimed that the information was “false” and derided the media for allegedly disseminating “propaganda” before issuing a thinly veiled threat to Pentagon officials.
His threats have not deterred everyone. Pushing back, federal workers told Politico that they are speaking out because of the billionaire’s “move fast and break things” approach via the Department of Government Efficiency.
“Leakers are patriots,” one Agriculture Department employee told the outlet and said that they were motivated by “a desire for greater transparency” – the same goal Musk claims through DOGE.
“We are public servants, not Elon’s servants,” a Food and Drug Administration staffer told Politico. “The public deserves to know how dysfunctional, destructive, and deceptive all of this has been and continues to be.”
“If the Biden administration or Obama had acted like this, no one would have tolerated it,” another staffer told the outlet. “The Trump administration doesn’t get a pass.”
However some federal staffers are nervous about the repercussions of talking to the press.
“We’re taking more conversations in-person, out of the office completely. Putting phones on airplane mode or going to the basement,” an employee at the National Institutes of Health told Politico. “I don’t take my phone when I’m talking to coworkers anymore. I assume there are cameras and listening devices everywhere.”
Musk’s threats followed a New York Times report Thursday that military officials would show him a slideshow of how the U.S. would engage in a conflict with China. The briefing reportedly consisted of 20 to 30 slides outlining the U.S.’s strategy if war broke out with the adversary in the Far East.
Sources said Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth was informed of the plans on Wednesday.
“The New York Times is pure propaganda. Also, I look forward to the prosecutions of those at the Pentagon who are leaking maliciously false information to NYT,” Musk posted on X Friday, sharing a Truth Social Post from President Donald Trump denying the claims.
“They will be found,” Musk added.
“The Fake News is at it again, this time the Failing New York Times. They said, incorrectly, that Elon Musk is going to the Pentagon tomorrow to be briefed on any potential ‘war with China,’” Trump said in the Truth Social post. “How ridiculous?’ China will not even be mentioned or discussed. How disgraceful it is that the discredited media can make up such lies. Anyway, the story is completely untrue!!!”
The president later said in the Oval Office that Musk was at the Pentagon for “DOGE, not there for China.”
