Elon Musk hinted on Saturday that his team focused on government efficiency was aiming to oversee the Treasury Department’s distribution of trillions of dollars to Americans as a way to prevent fraudulent or unlawful transactions.
Musk, a billionaire and adviser to former President Donald Trump, reacted on X to a post discussing the unexpected resignation of David Lebryk, the Treasury’s highest-ranking career official, on Friday.
Reports suggest Lebryk had disagreements with individuals linked to Musk regarding granting access to the Treasury’s highly sensitive payment infrastructure.
“According to the @DOGE team, investigations revealed that Treasury payment officers were allegedly ordered to greenlight all transactions, even when recipients were linked to fraud or terrorism,” Musk claimed, referring to the Department of Government Efficiency. “Throughout their entire careers, they supposedly never rejected a single payment. Not once.”
However, Musk did not present any concrete evidence to support his assertion that Treasury officials were instructed to approve payments to illicit groups.
On Saturday, The New York Times revealed that Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent had authorized DOGE representatives to gain full access to the federal payment network.
A spokesperson for the Treasury Department did not respond to requests for comment, nor did a White House representative linked to Musk’s DOGE team.
The Bureau of Fiscal Service, which manages Treasury’s payment infrastructure, has a specialized office dedicated to detecting, preventing, and recovering fraudulent or improper transactions. Treasury claims that these measures have blocked nearly $155 million in unauthorized payments and facilitated the recovery of around $350 million.
“The Bureau of Fiscal Service remains strictly nonpartisan,” said Lily Batchelder, who previously oversaw tax policy as a Treasury official under the Biden administration. “It is extremely troubling that White House political appointees appear to be interfering with essential programs like Social Security and tax refunds.”
Democratic lawmakers have pushed back against attempts by Trump-era appointees and Musk’s DOGE group to exert greater influence over a federal payment system traditionally managed by neutral, career professionals.
“Simply put, these payment networks must not fail, and any politically driven interference poses a serious threat to both the nation and the economy,” wrote Sen. Ron Wyden, the top Democrat on the Senate Finance Committee, in a letter to Bessent on Friday night.
Here’s a rewritten version with significantly different wording:
The Government Accountability Office got to conclusion that the federal government could be losing between $233 billion and $521 billion each year because of frauds.
In the 2024 fiscal year, federal agencies reported a total of $236 billion in erroneous or improper payments. The majority of these losses stemmed from programs such as Medicare, Medicaid, unemployment benefits, pandemic relief loans for small businesses, the Treasury’s earned income tax credit, and Social Security disbursements.
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