Data, chaos, revenge The dangerous restructuring plan of Trump and Musk

Donald Trump is concentrating more and more power: together with Elon Musk, he is usurping financial sovereignty. Even conservative voices are warning of a constitutional crisis. Yet the restructuring of the state has only just begun.

Donald Trump's behavior will be the subject of "Real Time with Bill Maher" on January 31. "Now he wants to send 30,000 illegal immigrants to Guantanamo Bay," says the namesake of the HBO show.

He continues: "I get it, you guys: this is what people voted for. But I kind of feel sorry for them, these pitiful, powerless people he's pushing around." Maher pauses for effect. "I'm talking about Congress."

Brian Riedl probably can't laugh at that. "The Trump administration has basically declared war on Article I of the Constitution," the political scientist from the conservative think tank Manhattan Institute for Policy Research explains to Salon. Article I regulates the separation of powers in the political system, but above all also determines how the state is financed by the House of Representatives and Congress.

Conservatives warn of "constitutional crisis"

The fact that Elon Musk is now interfering in this funding system with his extra-legal DOGE department undermines the constitution. Moreover, President Trump only has the authority to temporarily suspend government payments. But Musk and Trump don't care: "It's clear that they want to blow up the underlying structure of the programs and suspend payments indefinitely," says Riedl.

If Congress is not responsible for the finances through legislation, they could end up in the hands of individuals - and the power to declare war or impose tariffs now also lies with the president. "So what is the point of a Congress at all?" asks Riedl critically. Alan Cole, an economist at the conservative Tax Foundation, also writes of a "constitutional crisis".

The fact that the US president now holds so much power "really makes no structural sense", says Philip Wallach. "How can you negotiate a consensus on spending if the president can renegotiate the terms of the agreement after the fact?" asks the political scientist from the conservative American Enterprise Institute "Salon". "You can't just change the law by acting unilaterally."

Data octopus DOGE

Trump sees it differently. He is nonchalantly scrapping the constitutionally guaranteed place of birth principle, even though he is now encountering legal resistance. He is dissolving USAID, although he would need the approval of Congress to abolish the development agency, the conservative Wall Street Journal complains. Trump does not contest this.

Nor will there be any change to the power of the DOGE department, which political scientist Wallach classifies as "legally questionable". On the contrary: Musk's people first locked the employees of the Office of Personnel Management (OPM) out of their computer systems and then withdrew data. The same goes for the Treasury Department.

"Those outside the federal government may not understand the gravity of the situation," writes an ex-official at Slate. "The OPM manages the private data of federal civil servants - bank routing numbers, addresses, insurance data, retirement accounts, employment data. All payment details - from social welfare to research expenses - come from the Ministry of Finance.

19 to 25-year-olds "save" America

DOGE now has "all this private information that was previously given in confidence, handled carefully and regulated by law". As "Wired" reports, the department, which reports directly to Trump, now also employs outsiders hired by Elon Musk.

A group of 19 to 25-year-olds from the tech industry are to make the government more efficient. Marko Elez is responsible for the financial data: the 25-year-old used to work at Musk's company SpaceX. Gavin Kliger comes from an AI company: the 25-year-old, who operates as a "Special Advisor to the Director", instructs USAID employees by email to stay at home.

Kliger also writes that he turned down "a seven-figure salary" "to save America". It is not entirely clear what Edward Corstine is doing at DOGE. The 19-year-old is still at college. In the summer, the son of a popcorn manufacturer did an internship at Neuralink, a company owned by Musk. He claims to be an "expert", according to Wired.

"Hostile takeover of the state apparatus"

This is unprecedented, says Don Moynihan from the University of Michigan: "Actors who are not actually civil servants are gaining access to the most sensitive government data. So it feels like a hostile takeover of the state apparatus by the richest man in the world."

Yet the major restructuring has only just begun. With the declared aim of making the state leaner, the White House is aiming to lay off five to ten percent of government employees. As a result, many have been offered the chance to resign by February 6 in return for a severance payment, as it is not certain what will happen to them. 20,000 - one percent - have accepted.

While less government sounds good as a concept, the question remains as to whether the administration will continue to function as it should. A negative example is air traffic control, whose director was fired while the staff were told to resign. Air traffic controller training was frozen and a safety panel was removed before a fatal plane crash in Washington on January 29.

Trump "feels most comfortable in chaos"

CIA has also made such an offer to its employees in order to "re-energize" the secret service, CNN knows. The White House is less subtle when it comes to other security services, as the planned persecution of investigators and prosecutors investigating the storming of the Capitol shows.

FBI agents therefore filed a lawsuit in New York on February 4 to prevent Trump's team from gaining access to the relevant data, reports the New York Times. Up to 6,000 people are said to be affected, hardly any of whom are likely to have chosen the case.

Trump also wants to use the state to take personal revenge. This can be seen when he withdraws state protection from Mike Pompeo, John Bolton or Anthony Fauci. "He said, 'They have money. Get your own security," explains Republican Chris Christie on Jon Stewart's podcast. But: "State security is much better. They have access to information that private services don't have."

Christie still supported Trump in 2016. "I believed in the system," he says. "Okay, people voted for him: I'm going to work within the system to make him better." In 2020, he realized: "He doesn't give a damn about the system." Political chaos is desirable: "He loves working like this. He feels most comfortable in chaos."