The new Department of Government Efficiency leader isn’t getting a paycheck and doesn’t need one — Elon Musk’s $418 billion net worth as of Monday rivaled the entire gross domestic product of Denmark at last count.
But what was once thought of as an outside advisory board is now very much inside the federal government and drawing an official salary, so to speak. Nearly $7 million has been “apportioned” over the past week to cover the agency’s expenses, while the administration tries to freeze big chunks of government funding as part of DOGE’s mandate to root out programs deemed wasteful or out of step with the president’s priorities.
“Despite fabricating the United States DOGE Service out of thin air, President Musk has already grown his unelected bureaucracy to lay claim to nearly $7 million of American taxpayer funding,” House Appropriations ranking member Rosa DeLauro, D-Conn., said in a statement. She said that amount is “nearly twice the annual salaries and expenses budget of the White House.”
On his first day in office, President Donald Trump signed an executive order creating the Musk-led “United States DOGE Service” out of what used to be called the United States Digital Service.
The old U.S. Digital Service had been technically part of the Office of Management and Budget, drawing its annual budget from an account within the Executive Office of the President labeled “Information Technology Oversight and Reform.”
A White House official said the DOGE “apportionments” — which is OMB speak for gradual release of appropriated funds — simply represent what had instead been going to the Digital Service before it was transformed into DOGE.
The total $6.75 million apportionments came in two bites — an initial $750,000 on Jan. 27 followed by $6 million on Jan. 30 — for “unanticipated needs” within the Executive Office of the President, according to data made public by the OMB.
Footnotes in the releases say the money “[p]rovides for anticipated reimbursements from agencies in support of Software Modernization Initiative.” This means the money is being provided to DOGE to perform work on the agencies’ behalf and using their money to pay for it, a House Democratic aide said.
Trump’s executive order spells out that DOGE “shall commence a Software Modernization Initiative to improve the quality and efficiency of government-wide software, network infrastructure, and information technology (IT) systems.” That’s similar in mission to the former Digital Service, which was initially created during the Obama administration.
Privacy concerns
But DOGE’s purpose that goes unstated in the executive order creating it — but very publicly articulated by Musk — is much more sweeping than simply updating government IT systems. The Tesla, X and SpaceX CEO has been granted access to some of the most sensitive federal government data in search of programs to cancel and entire agencies to shut down, in some instances.
The executive order gave hints of this maneuvering that are only becoming clear now: “Agency Heads shall take all necessary steps … and to the maximum extent consistent with law, to ensure USDS has full and prompt access to all unclassified agency records, software systems, and IT systems.”
The order goes on to say that DOGE “shall adhere to rigorous data protection standards,” but critics inside and outside the government don’t believe that’s what Musk intends. Two AFL-CIO member unions and the Alliance for Retired Americans, a nonprofit, filed suit in federal court Monday seeking to enjoin DOGE’s access to Treasury’s electronic payment system managing some $6 trillion in annual disbursements.
“The scale of the intrusion into individuals’ privacy is massive and unprecedented. Millions of people cannot avoid engaging in financial transactions with the federal government and, therefore, cannot avoid having their sensitive personal and financial information maintained in government records,” the complaint says. “People who must share information with the federal government should not be forced to share information with Elon Musk or his ‘DOGE.’ And federal law says they do not have to.”
Senate Appropriations ranking member Patty Murray said Monday that Democrats were “pulling the fire alarm” on Musk’s activities but that it was up to Republicans to stand up to Musk and put a stop to his activities.
“Think about how many dollars he himself makes from government contracts and the Trump administration is handing the keys to the Treasury to him,” Murray, D-Wash., said. “It does not get more blatantly corrupt than that.”
Senate Minority Leader Charles E. Schumer, D-N.Y., said he and House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries, D-N.Y., plan to introduce legislation to block Musk’s access to Treasury data. Jeffries on Monday separately wrote to colleagues that Democrats must insist in government funding negotiations that language is included compelling the administration to release funds appropriated by Congress.
‘Not many Spartans’
It wasn’t immediately clear what specifically DOGE was being reimbursed for with the $6.75 million. Musk’s team includes includes “six young men — all apparently between the ages of 19 and 24,” according to Wired, which said at least one was working for no pay. Other reports attested to their software engineering skills, despite their youth.
Musk did not dispute the reports in posts on his X social media platform. “Not many Spartans are needed to win battles,” Musk wrote in one post, and in another highlighted the group’s technical talents. Other apparent DOGE team members are older, more established IT veterans, such as Tom Krause, CEO of Citrix operator Cloud Software Group Inc., The New York Times reported.
Trump in December named Katie Miller — whose husband is Stephen Miller, the president’s deputy chief of staff — to the DOGE team as well.
Funding history
DOGE’s apportionments on Jan. 27 and Jan. 30 say the money comes from funds appropriated in the second fiscal 2024 appropriations package. That law provided $8 million for the Information Technology Oversight and Reform account that used to fund the U.S. Digital Service, down from $13.7 million in fiscal 2023.
The House’s fiscal 2025 Financial Services bill proposed to flat-fund the account at the current level, while the Senate proposed to up that amount to $30 million. Now with the advent of DOGE, it will be interesting to see how much the ITOR account receives in the final spending legislation due March 14, when the stopgap law runs out.
On top of annual appropriations, the Digital Service received $200 million directly as part of the 2021 pandemic relief package. Lawmakers have been trying to tap that money for other things, eventually agreeing to rescind $10 million of it in the fiscal 2024 law — after senators initially tried to claw back $80 million. That pandemic relief funding had a deadline for obligation of Sept. 30, 2024, so any remaining funds from that appropriation are likely unavailable at this point.
The annual appropriations language typically says the money is for “necessary expenses for the furtherance of integrated, efficient, secure, and effective uses of information technology in the Federal Government.” It also gives the OMB director authority to “transfer these funds to one or more other agencies to carry out projects to meet these purposes.”
One new element in the DOGE apportionment is that the group now has its own Treasury account, separate from ITOR.
The House Democratic aide pointed out that this appears to be an attempt to stand up DOGE separately within the Executive Office of the President outside of the OMB’s purview. That would be in line with Trump’s executive order, which stipulates that the DOGE administrator report directly to White House chief of staff Susie Wiles.
Aidan Quigley and David Lerman contributed to this report.
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