Four DHS officials working for the sub-agency FEMA are being terminated after they violated one of President Donald Trump's executive orders. As RedState reported, a payment of $59 million was sent to luxury hotels in New York City to house illegal immigrants during the first week of February. That came after the White House ordered a stop to such spending, with the intention being to redirect the money to disaster relief for Americans.

No matter the intent, it is an unassailable fact that in these three instances involving Politico, the New York Times, and the AP, the massive increase in their subscription business with the US government coincides with Joe Biden's election and is really obvious by February 2021, Biden's first full month in office. There is no such volume of subscriptions in either the Obama or Trump administrations. //

Trump needs to order an investigation into this unseemly financial connection between the Biden administration and the media that covered it and give America a full accounting of what they find. //

anon-mdjj
2 days ago
Since the subscriptions were purchased with my tax money, I demand complete and total access to all the politico pro and NYT subscription services.

What Democrats have done is open the door wide open for a bureaucratic state bloodbath, and no one can say they weren't warned.

epaddon
20 hours ago
This Senator's defense of Sesame Street is brought to you by the letters B and S.

Almost 70 years ago, the U.S. State Department dispatched a new ambassador to a Southeast Asian nation. As often seemed to happen, the new U.S. official was no expert on the nation, its economy, or its culture. He did not speak the language. And his concerns were more geopolitical and career-oriented. //

Communism at the time of that ambassador’s appointment was the worst threat ever to global democracy. It had already taken over Eastern Europe, prompted the Korean War, and was inspiring guerrilla movements around the world, especially in Asia, where some colonial powers like France still reigned.

Using the American Revolution against Britain as his model for successful guerilla warfare, Ho Chi Minh was succeeding in ousting the French from Indochina, soon to become Vietnam.

It turns out, this story about the ignorant, bumbling new U.S. ambassador was all made up, total fiction. It was the plot of “The Ugly American,” a blockbuster 1958 novel that would shape the thinking of a future president and millions more through a successful movie starring some actor in his 30s named Marlon Brando.

The compelling book by Eugene Burdick and William Lederer was a longtime best-seller. It spoke to a deep-seated American fear, which survives to this day, that the world’s bad guys would be victorious because a naïve United States, geographically isolated from foreign trouble spots, failed to fully accept its responsibility to help other countries and thereby protect itself. //

During and long after World War I, the U.S. produced and sent millions of tons of food to feed war-torn Europe. That effort was spearheaded by an Iowa orphan and mining engineer named Herbert Hoover, who gained international fame.

He also served as Secretary of Commerce and, in 1928, became the first Quaker and last Cabinet member to win election as president.

The vast Marshall Plan to feed and rebuild Europe after World War II cemented a reputation for generosity in the minds of the world and ourselves and a dawning awareness that Americans had a strong self-interest in helping others.

As someone who read Ugly American at the time, I can say the psychological impact of that book was even stronger than the 1974 one for “Jaws,” which unleashed our inner fears of immense monsters just out of sight.

The warnings of Ugly American — that the U.S. had to be smarter abroad — so impressed first-term Sen. John F. Kennedy (D-MA) that he gave copies to every other senator. And then, two years later, he took those impressions with him into the White House with some lethal consequences. //

Just four months into his presidency, Kennedy reversed President Eisenhower’s policy of non-intervention in foreign conflicts. That had kept the U.S. out of fighting in Indochina and Egypt when France and Britain seized the Suez Canal.

Fatefully, in May 1961, Kennedy sent 500 troops to South Vietnam. They were just going to advise the local army, you understand, in its struggle against Communists infiltrating from North Vietnam. //

Fast forward to Afghanistan, 2001. The initial decision seemed reasonable for the U.S. and NATO allies to attack al Qaeda there and the Taliban, which had hosted terrorist training camps for the 9/11 attacks.

But then, once again, mission creep slipped in. //

Three hundred years before Christ, Alexander the Great could not pacify what became Afghanistan. Nor could the British in the 1800s. In 1989, the Soviets gave up their attempt after 10 years.

It took the U.S. and allies 20 years before they gave up and left in a humiliating 2021 withdrawal that Joe Biden's ineptness made worse than necessary.

The Western costs were 2,465 U.S. service fatalities, 1,144 allied and contractor deaths, and $2.3 trillion.

The Taliban won anyway.

Now, we return to the U.S. Agency for International Development, which was active there. The goal of President Kennedy, who also founded the Peace Corps, was to unite scattered foreign aid programs in one semi-independent agency under the State Department to promote social and economic progress in other countries. //

There is no doubt, however, that some of the billions distributed by USAID have benefited many millions. The agency helped eradicate smallpox, stemmed the spread of AIDS in Africa, and provides treatments.

The mission was to make investments abroad that would encourage and ignite further progress. Not provide free lunches today but teach literacy so people could get better jobs tomorrow. Help provide clean water and teach better health care, especially for infants and children. Provide nutritional guidance. Improve agricultural methods to boost production and reduce erosion and pests. //

The fact is that although the U.S. is by far the world’s largest provider of foreign aid, such spending only runs around one percent of the total federal budget of $6.1 trillion; in Fiscal Year 2023, it was 1.2 percent. //

Everyone from Musk's young children to his ex-wives is named and described in the piece, some in ways clearly meant to provoke embarrassment. To be sure, there is no valid reason for any of these family members to be thrust into the public eye, and The Hill's framing makes it clear that this is in retaliation for Musk daring to take "an influential Washington role" in reforming the bureaucracy. It's the mobster tactic of winking and nodding while saying, "That's a nice family you've got there. It'd be a shame if anything were to happen to them."

I'd say the mainstream press should be ashamed of itself, but we all know its members possess no shame to offer. These "journalists" operate like ghoulish leeches, willing to publish anything to serve their political wants. There are no boundaries, and some news outlets sure seem to nudging others into committing physical attacks on Musk and his family.

That attitude extends to Democrat politicians as well, who have made "Elon Musk wasn't elected" a rallying cry, as if his appointment is somehow invalid while the unelected bureaucrats are unassailable. Sen Elizabeth Warren (D-MA) recently ranted and raved that people need to use "every tool" to stop Musk.

Acting Consumer Financial Protection Bureau Russ Vought has frozen all new funding to that agency. In a memo to Federal Reserve Chairman Jerome Powell, Vought, who was just confirmed as Office of Management and Budget Director, said, "This letter is to inform you that in the Third Quarter of Fiscal Year 2025, the Bureau is requesting $0."

Earlier, Vought had announced that he'd discovered the CFPB was sitting on a $711.6 million "reserve fund." //

The beauty of this move is that when Elizabeth Warren set up the CFPB, she attempted to insulate it from influence or management by either the Executive or Legislative branches. Contrary to other agencies that are managed by a group of directors who the president can remove, the CFPB had a single director who could only be removed for cause. The Supreme Court struck down that arrangement in 2020. She also had the CFPB draw funds directly from the Federal Reserve, bypassing the appropriation process. In the best "it isn't a tax" tradition of John Roberts's jurisprudence, that funding arrangement survived a Supreme Court challenge. This combination of events has led to a situation where one man, that would be Russ Vought, can do pretty much as he wishes because there is no Congressional oversight, and he can't be forced to spend money because there are no appropriations. //

This letter is to inform you that for the Third Quarter of Fiscal Year 2025, the Bureau is requesting $0.

During my review of the Bureau's finances, I have learned that the Bureau has a balance of $711,586,678.00 in the Bureau of Consumer Financial Protection Fund. By law, I must take account of this sum when determining the amount "reasonably necessary" for the Bureau to fulfill its statutory authorities.

I have determined that no additional funds are necessary to carry out the authorities of the Bureau for Fiscal Year 2025. The Bureau's current funds are more than sufficient — and are, in fact, excessive — to carry out its authorities in a manner that is consistent with the public interest.

When DOGE found empty fields in Treasury's payment system, they uncovered more than missing data.
They found a mechanism.

Simple things were left blank:

Payment categories

Payment rationales

Basic audit controls

The kind of fields any small business would require. The kind that let you track where money goes. The kind that stop a billion dollars of fraud. Every week.

Here's what Treasury didn't want exposed:

Over $100 billion flowing annually to accounts without Social Security numbers. No temporary ID numbers. No verification. Nothing.

When Musk asked Treasury officials how much was "unequivocal and obvious fraud," the answer revealed decades of corruption: HALF

Let that sink in.

$50 billion per YEAR.

A billion dollars every SINGLE week disappearing into accounts that shouldn't exist.

The kind of fraud that would shut down any bank in America.

The kind that would land any business owner in federal prison.

But Treasury had perfected its system:

Process payments

Ignore controls

Keep the machine running. //

Nineteen Democratic state attorneys general filed suit. Not about the fraud. Not about the waste. Not about billions vanishing into accounts without SSNs. But about "protecting" the Treasury Department from its own Secretary.

A judge in New York responded with something unprecedented: an ex parte order blocking Treasury officials from accessing their own department's data. No warning. No chance to respond. No opportunity to present evidence. Just a wall between the people elected to fix the system and the system itself.

Think about what that means: The Secretary of the Treasury—effectively the CFO of the United States government—legally barred from seeing how money moves through his own department. The people's appointee blocked from viewing the people's accounts. Young coders mapping the missing controls ordered to stop looking.

The clock struck 2 AM on Jan 21, 2025.
In Treasury's basement, fluorescent lights hummed above four young coders. Their screens cast blue light across government-issue desks, illuminating energy drink cans and agency badges. As their algorithms crawled through decades of payment data, one number kept growing: $17 billion in redundant programs. And counting.

"We're in," Akash Bobba messaged the team. "All of it."

Edward Coristine's code had already mapped three subsystems. Luke Farritor's algorithms were tracing payment flows across agencies. Ethan Shaotran's analysis revealed patterns that career officials didn't even know existed. By dawn, they would understand more about Treasury's operations than people who had worked there for decades.

This wasn't a hack. This wasn't a breach. This was authorized disruption.

While career bureaucrats prepared orientation packets and welcome memos, DOGE's team was already deep inside the payment systems. No committees. No approvals. No red tape. Just four coders with unprecedented access and algorithms ready to run.

"The beautiful thing about payment systems," noted a transition official watching their screens, "is that they don't lie. You can spin policy all day long, but money leaves a trail." //

By Inauguration Day, over 1,000 pre-vetted personnel stood ready—each armed with clear objectives, mapped legal authorities, and direct lines to support networks. This wasn't just staffing; it was a battle plan decades in the making.

"This is the new normal," Vice President JD Vance declared from his West Wing office, studying real-time data flows across agency systems. "He's having the time of his life," he added, referring to the President's relentless drive. "We've done more in two weeks than others did in years." //

For the permanent bureaucracy, this wasn't just change. It was an extinction-level event. Their power came from controlling who got paid, when they got paid, and what they got paid for. Now those controls were evaporating like dawn burning away darkness.

The pattern was devastating in its simplicity:

1. Map the money flows
2. Deploy aligned personnel
3. Expose the networks
4. Restructure the systems
   //

This isn't just reform. This isn't just change. This is American governance reimagined.

What he never bothers to explain is how state attorneys general have any standing to challenge the internal workflows of the Treasury Department, how auditing a system within the Treasury Department is beyond the power of the Treasury Department, how the Executive Branch can violate the separation of powers by carrying out an audit, or how DOGE's action is anything other than the epitome of the "Take Care Clause" which would seem to anyone without TDS to require laws to be obeyed.

It should be to no one's shock that the lead clown in this pathetic circus of TDS sufferers is Letitia James.

The complaint presents a veritable "parade of horribles" of things that "might" happen, which, even if true, fall in the "not your circus, not your monkey" category of complaints. //

This will turn out to be more performative than real. When a federal judge ordered a halt to Trump's spending freeze (see Biden Judge Puts Trump's Spending Freeze on Hold and Orders the Feeding Trough Opened), the administration essentially answered, "yeah, no."

Defendants do not read the Order to prevent the President or his advisors from communicating with federal agencies or the public about the President’s priorities regarding federal spending. Nor do Defendants construe the Order as enjoining the President’s Executive Orders, which are plainly lawful and unchallenged in this case. Further, Defendants do not read the Order as imposing compliance obligations on federal agencies that are not Defendants in this case. Defendants respectfully request that the Court notify Defendants if they have misunderstood the intended scope of the Court’s Order. //

We'll soon see how Attorney General Bondi responds to this nonsense and if she's willing to draw a line at this sort of judicial overreach. If she goes along with it, it effectively means that the President literally does not have the authority to give directions to the Executive Branch, and the Treasury Secretary cannot establish policies in his agency without getting the approval of some judge somewhere based on the complaint of random people. //

Lugger66
a day ago
As i said u might as well have a judge say DT cant be POTUS.
Truth is not only does this need to be slapped down they need to be punished. //

anon-adwq
a day ago
Treasury Secretary made the DOGE auditors employees of the Treasury. So the Judge's order now applies to people who do not exist ("outside auditors"). Game, set, match. Trump's team is well ahead of the flailing activist Democrat judges. They can scream into the wind. The common meme picture of the screaming Karen can be updated to wearing judicial robes. Gotta love it! //

PubliusCryptus
a day ago
This conflict is a make or break event. The Judiciary has been out of control for generations now and it must be forced back into its Constitutionally defined role. Judges who exceed their authority must be removed from the bench and prosecuted for abuse of their powers. Their abuse has been going on for so long and their hubris has reached such a level that I fear simply ignoring them will not solve this problem. Arrest and imprison them.

GBenton
a day ago
This is what I'm talking about, lol. They're so cooked.

The Swamp depended on both parties keeping secrets about how the Uniparty is a parasitic infection in our government.

But Trump isn't playing the game of going into government with a few hundred grand salary and suddenly being worth tens or hundreds of millions of dollars.

He and Musk have F U money already.

And they are opening the books to a People's Audit (that sounds communistic, but I mean it in a populist sense), and they are gonna destroy these vampires with good old fashioned sunlight.

The Dems could tie him up in court, they could log jam in Congress, and they could use agencies to sandbag with noncompliance.

But they can't stop being exposed by sunlight when Musk controls the largest social media platform and the public is already super pissed off.

This is check mate, Dems.

Any move you make to resist makes you complicit to corruption.

Trump and Musk are not going for incremental reform, they are tearing down what the Uniparty has built over the past century.

Take that, Frankfurt School and Cloward Piven - THIS is how you collapse a corrupt system.

NavyVet GBenton
a day ago
Exposing the flood of illegal outflow is one thing. The next step is to uncover where it went.

Where did those tens of millions of accumulated small donations to ActBlue come from? Methinks these streams of illegal payments.

Now, if the democrats did not know, were innocent, they would be just as curious as us, and just as outraged. The fact that they are doing all they can to obstruct, prevent exposure, prevent scrutiny, tells us, they already know what we will find. They are guilty and they know it.

At this point, they would be wise to cut their losses, demand transparency along with us, and be happy that all they lost is the wellspring of our tax dollars. But they are not wise. By fighting exposure, they implicate themselves as knowing criminals.

RICO! RICO! RICO! You listening, Pam? RICO!

GBenton NavyVet
a day ago
Yes, and the bitch for the corrupt is that DOGE is bringing receipts.

The downside of the surveillance state they built is that it's now being used to expose their fraud.

Sorry, not sorry, lol.

Their Frankenstein monster is gonna destroy them.

anon-73eu GBenton
20 hours ago
I think I love that the most. Obama set up the Digital Dept that Trump is going to use to nail everyone of those idiots. And oh my, the RICO possibilities. (yeah had to clean up what I really wanted to write).

Obama 'What magic wand do you have?' to Trump on the economy in 2016.
Trump 'YOURS' on fixing everything else in 2025.

Congress illegally spent at least $516 billion in 2024 on programs for which there was no authorization. Yes, billion, with a "b." A stunning report by the Congressional Budget Office underscores the reason for the legal assault upon President Trump's right to audit payments by the Treasury Department.

In a report titled "Expired and Expiring Authorizations of Appropriations for Fiscal Year 2024," the CBO observes: "Historically, House and Senate rules restrict lawmakers from considering an appropriation if it lacks a current authorization." Nevertheless, "CBO estimates that $516 billion was appropriated for 2024 for activities with expired authorizations, which the agency identified for each House and Senate authorizing committee and appropriations subcommittee." That $516 billion in illegal payments cover "1,264 authorizations of appropriations that expired before the beginning of fiscal year 2024 and 251 authorizations of appropriations that were set to expire by the end of fiscal year 2024." The legal authority for some of these payments expired 40 — that's not a typo — years ago. //

Making this all the more intriguing is that it would seem that the President could stop those payments without worrying about violating the Impoundment Control Act as they are not legal appropriations by Congress's rules.

I will guarantee you that when DOGE really digs into this, they are going to find other ongoing illegal payments on a Biblical scale.

While the final fate of USAID is in the hands of Congress, there is no doubt that the organization's reputation has been burned to the ground. Perhaps more important is the people, domestic and abroad, who managed the web of leftist programs will not have the financial staying power to wait until this all gets settled. They will move on to other jobs. Lastly, we've turned the spotlight on the truth of how our money was used to spread political propaganda inside the United States to support one of the two major political parties.

Department of Government Efficiency @DOGE
Unburdened by what has been.

Elon Musk @elonmusk
·
This building is now occupied by @CBP
9:10 PM · Feb 7, 2025. //

This is the new headquarters for US Customs and Border Protection.

If the agency is able to survive this near-death experience, nothing will ever be the same again.

GBenton
18 hours ago
I can only imagine what it's like to try to run a blog with this much incoming news.

But if the Democrats planned on a 90 day effort from Trump with something to fight every month or every week, they were woefully unprepared for something new every day - multiple times a day.

With social media coverage on X and on New Media like Red State and even Fox 24/7.

If this pace keeps up, can't see how they find their footing.

Especially when Trump's DOGE is cutting off their money supply and exposing genuine scandals that the public is outraged over because it affirms the frustrations that caused them to vote for Trump in the first place.

Dems are in deep, deep existential crap.

They probably shouldn't have tried to imprison Trump or delete him.

He's got no choice but to tear their stuff by the roots and scorch the earth so they can't regrow.

A century of Marxism is getting taken head on and from all sides.

OrneryCoot GBenton
18 hours ago
Ain't life grand? Trump figured out where the money was coming from and went for the throat. He has a good number of other targets, but this one will really sting a long list of players in the progressive movement, inside and outside of the government. Now to proceed at the same speed to the next targets.

GBenton OrneryCoot
17 hours ago
Because of how Trump 1.0 struggled with obstacles I suspected he would hit the Democrats on their weak flank rather than fuss with a slim majority in Congress.

My assumption was he would expose their corruption and criminality and destroy their brand so they would lose more seats in the mid terms and he'd secure his legacy in 2028.

The swamp is their home turf and there are enough Qusiling RINOs to sabotage his agenda in Congress and the courts are too often partisan adversaries rather than adjudicators of the law.

But the Democrats are a confidence game. They depend on the public not seeing what they are really doing.

I thought he'd focus on Crossfire Hurricane and a litany of other stuff like that to dirty them up.

Instead, Musk hit a flank I didn't even know existed in such a concentrated target - USAID is their piggy bank.

Sure, I figured they were corrupt, but that the whole mess could be exposed that quickly was a surprise to me - and probably them, too.

Now I'm positive this is just the tip of the iceberg. Every agency will reveal more rot.

And the states probably have satellite operations that mimic the larger pattern. Then there's the international stuff and NGOs and scumbags like Soros, etc.

The public is angry about inflation and crime and Trump exposed the Dems are stealing money and they ARE criminals.

Maybe they can survive this but I don't see how if all their grubby paws just got caught in the cookie jar.

After Trump's speech the other day about God and unity, it seems to me he will gut and destroy them but he will also make deals with Democrats like perhaps RFKjr to take over the husk of the party once he's done burning it to the ground.

The current leadership is all done though, the dominos he's set up haven't fallen - yet.

But he just said today there was "possibly" criminality with the funds at USAID.

In Trump-speak that means he has evidence of criminality.

Like I've been saying, he knows they tried to kill him. They ignored Sun Tzu and left him no way out but to go through them.

He can't just let power swap back and forth with the Uniparty every 2 to 4 years - they will never leave Trump or his family in peace.

So he has to destroy their machine. We're a few weeks in and they're taking massive hits that seem to be aimed at toppling them.

OrneryCoot GBenton
14 hours ago
With the way that Trump has become a one man wrecking ball for the Democrats along with his absolutely soaring approval from the public, I think that it may be a bit harder for the quislings to try and stop him. Not if they want to stay in office. The RNC is firmly in Trump's camp, and they control a lot of the money that goes into the midterm campaigns. Those who aren't on board may suddenly find themselves in the same position as Cheney and Kissinger...pariahs from the political world. It's all about the momentum and the scoreboard. So far, Trump is doing well enough to counter even the more prominent quislings like McConnell. If he keeps racking up wins, especially wins like USAID which are just bananas in their scope, I expect some legislation that will make those wins permanent. If Trump can get the House and Senate to start making real cuts in the Leviathan, we may yet save the country.

GBenton Light dispels darkness
17 hours ago
I'm guessing the controlled opposition, the RINOs, the Dems pet accomplices, are gonna be real quiet and hope they don't get exposed.

The impression I get is that Trump is so far ahead of them, he's got so much power in the government they built to oppress us, and so muchdirt on them that the old games are not gonna work.

He played their game last time.

This time, he's hitting them from all sides and he already knows all their weaknesses.

The thing to remember is they are all criminals and traitors.

And Trump can expose them all.

I'd bet money there are terms of surrender being negotiated behind the scenes with some pretty big names.

As soon as they really get that Trump already has them a move or two away from check mate they'll do whatever it takes to save their asses.

They can't even take him out because he's already got enough dirt to expose them even if he's gone.

The ultimate insurance policy is having them dead to rights.

Aesthetica @Anc_Aesthetics
·
This is the doxxer at the WSJ who doxxed the DOGE team member and got him fired. She worked at Business Insider who have a history of doxxing people and she was funded by USAID. It looks like she was hired solely to go after the DOGE team.
9:34 PM · Feb 6, 2025

Aesthetica @Anc_Aesthetics
·
Replying to @Anc_Aesthetics
Also worked as a USAID contractor, how did she get access to tweets from a deleted X account? We know USAID is just an offshoot of the CIA. This needs to be investigated.
10:01 PM · Feb 6, 2025

Aesthetica @Anc_Aesthetics
·
Replying to @Anc_Aesthetics
Very silly of her to post her email and signal like that when people can just flood her inbox with msgs that prevent her from doxxing anyone else
10:02 PM · Feb 6, 2025.

Mike Benz @MikeBenzCyber
·
That’s incredible. The journo who doxxed the DOGE staffer worked at 3 of the Top 4 Blobcraft Agencies I stress in lectures do organized political warfare as intelligence work: USAID, State, and DOD’s Political-Military branch. Literally the only resume point missing is CIA 😂

Sam Spade @MusicalPurist
This is the reporter who doxxed and got Marko Elez fired. Note her background:
1:50 AM · Feb 7, 2025. //

anon-BHS
40 minutes ago edited
Question....Who at the WSJ leadership level was the person who just hired K Long , "solely to go after the DOGE team"?
Next question....So, does this reveal to us that the WSJ is another one of the media publications (like Politico) who was receiving USAID funding??? (a discreet attempt to ruin DOGE before it uncovers/exposes their own involvement?)

You cannot make this up. Politico responded to the allegations that USAID was their sugar daddy and did not disappoint. It was an exercise in gaslighting and a terrible one at that. The Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) crew uncovered mountains of waste and fraud, which led to the agency being virtually shut down on Friday. It’ll be absorbed into the State Department, with most of its workers being furloughed.

Yet, USAID also spent millions on various media subscriptions. And while we won’t call it a funneling of cash per se, it pretty much was that, but with extra steps. The government was essentially running a state media operation, which is the Democrat-media complex personified. We knew it existed, and now we have literal receipts. //

NightStalker
2 hours ago edited
So, Politico Pro, for a mere $15,000-$20,000 a year will inform the government what the government is doing? Gotcha.

Commodore Decker NightStalker
2 hours ago edited
This is a distinction without a difference. It’s money, laundering, plain and simple. We’re not that stupid.

Take the “L“, politico. You’re looking like the proverbial elephant trying to hide behind the flagpole. All this proves is what we have known all along. You are a part of the Democrat/government/media information operation.

Adults familiar with the way these early forays into the dank underbelly of longtime bureaucratic Washington have a more cynical suspicion than Elon hunting down disgruntled Tesla mechs.

And it has to do with the last sentence in the quote I used above:

The Labor Department houses an enormous amount of confidential data, and includes the Bureau of Labor Statistics, which produces important economic data, including inflation readings and market-critical employment statistics

What if - what IF - the Wonder Boys get in there and find out the past four years of #Bidenomincs have been a manipulated fantasy?

A badly managed fraud?

A theater piece for the gullible who didn't pay attention to the numerous, massive, downward revisions in data quietly done months after publication. //

Mike Derscher @MDerscher
·
I’m more interested to what the Doge guys find when they start looking at the BLS data. They’ll be able to figure out if it is accurate or if it has been managed.
5:35 AM · Feb 6, 2025 //

According to this fellow below, the entire DOGE department was set up very carefully to be within all the legal parameters from the beginning to prevent challenges based on its legality.

This is part of his thread explaining what the Trump team did and it is so interesting. They didn't create a new department out of whole cloth. They renamed an existing one that was already authorized within the scope of the president's authority to oversee (an executive branch department) and had all the funding, etc, in situ.

https://threadreaderapp.com/thread/1887038847629877714.html.

The Trump team did their homework. I can't say that enough, and we're witnessing the fruits of it every single day - damn near something new every hour.

I expect that the Labor Department is going to be as big as a bag of different worms as USAID once this lawsuit gets tossed or negotiated.

I remember how we all kept getting told things were so wonderful if only our lying eyes would allow us to see it.

They all fell out of a coconut tree.

The looks on their faces. The chyron boldly reading, "DOGE Teen, Known Online As "Big Balls," Now an "Expert." It's simply a piece of art. If the "Newseum" still existed in Washington (it went out of business because no one cares about the supposed heroics of the legacy press) that screenshot would warrant its own exhibit. Everything about it is absurd, including the insinuation that what somebody called themselves online when they were a kid is a scandal.

What makes this so perfect is just how deeply concerned these press apparatchiks pretend to be. These are the same people who have never spent an ounce of energy worrying about the waste and corruption within the federal government when Democrats are in charge. Let Trump appoint a few people to root out that waste and corruption, though, and suddenly it's a national emergency for CNN and the rest of the legacy media.

No one believes any of this is sincere. It's all partisan politics, and if the press thinks they can scare DOGE off the trail by doxxing its members, they are sorely mistaken. //

Short-haired Red
12 minutes ago
Mark Zuckerberg founded Facebook when he was 19. Bill Gates founded Microsoft with Paul Allen when he was 19. Steve Jobs founded Apple with Steve Wozniak when he was 21. Scott Jennings needs to bring these truths onto CNN this morning. //

anon-g58b
34 minutes ago
Mozart wrote a symphony at 5. Mendelsohn was about 17 when he wrote Midsummer's Night Dream music (which includes the wedding march that almost everyone plays when the ceremony is over) Obama was in high school when he started toking.

Elon Musk and the Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) cut down USAID, which will effectively be shut down today. The entire operation will be absorbed into the State Department, keeping fewer than 300 out of a 10,000-person staff. The waste was unreal, and while the Left can only say this is a small budget item, that doesn’t negate the premise of DOGE, which is operating at the direction of President Donald J. Trump.

Also, isn’t that the most DC rebuke ever: well, it’s a little fraud. No, we’re done with that nonsense. And the only people who are furious are worthless federal workers and their Democrat allies who can no longer use USAID to subsidize their wasteful and arguably fraudulent pet projects on the taxpayers’ dime.

So, with Politico embarrassed and exposed by the reported USAID payola-rama, it’s hilarious that two anti-Elon Musk stories get published a day after the agency’s alleged subsidizing of the Democrat-media complex is exposed.

Representatives from Elon Musk’s U.S. DOGE Service have fed sensitive data from across the Education Department into artificial intelligence software to probe the agency’s programs and spending, according to two people with knowledge of the DOGE team’s actions.

The AI probe includes data with personally identifiable information for people who manage grants, as well as sensitive internal financial data, the two people said. They described DOGE activities at the Education Department on the condition of anonymity due to fear of retaliation.

The DOGE team is using AI software accessed through Microsoft’s cloud computing service Azure to pore through every dollar of money the department disburses, from contracts to grants to work trip expenses, one of the people said. Lower level department staffers were directed by agency leadership to let Musk’s teams access the sensitive financial data, the person said. //

If this is being weaponized to screw over the political class, trim the fat from government, and expose the waste and corruption as we’ve seen over the past few weeks, then so be it. Keep feeding that AI machine, which we’ll call Skynet but without the genocidal tendencies. //

Commodore Decker
8 hours ago edited
The use of the phrase “sensitive internal Financial data“ is intended to undermine the legitimacy of the effort and raise fears of privacy invasion. The good news is that the privacy being invaded are bureaucrats making these payments to pet left wing causes with your tax dollars which are hidden but which the AI software is able to expose.

The Democrats have spent decades constructing this Potemkin Village of payoffs, kickbacks, lazy unionized featherbedding work rules, and no accountability along with a sense of entitlement and privilege. The perfect employment for people with useless degrees and not a lot of work ethic. But like any house of cards, one good breeze can blow it all down. And it’s got them terrified. And it should because it’s long overdue.

I never imagined I would see this unfold so rapidly, but it’s great that it has because it’s got democrats completely unbalanced and unable to respond. Trump is inside their media decision cycle and inside their heads. They lash out with hysterics and retarded chants like Schumer the other day who had one of the most cringe worthy moments I’ve ever seen. And none of it seems to be working.

In the wake of the revelation that $34 million was transferred from taxpayer wallets into the coffers of far-left media outlet Politico, the Trump administration has ordered the General Services Administration (GSA) to terminate all media contracts for which the GSA currently pays. Included in the list of outlets affected are the aforementioned Politico—whose "Pro" product has gotten particular scrutiny—plus Bloomberg and the BBC. //

Marc Caputo
@MarcACaputo
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News: The White House has directed the GSA to terminate "every single media contract" expensed by the agency: "Politico, BBC, E&E (Politico sub) and Bloomberg"

"The eye of Sauron is on more than just Politico It's all the media," WH adviser says
axios.com
Scoop: Trump orders key government agency to cancel all media contracts
3:42 PM · Feb 6, 2025. //

ConservativeInMinnesota
5 hours ago
I checked Politico’s website yesterday. No subscription is needed online. International print editions max out at $600 per year. They are available in print for free in Washington DC.

There was no cost to use Politico. This was blatant money laundering to buy favorable news coverage. This is criminal, prosecute them. //

Hank Reardon
6 hours ago
I find myself commetning after just the first sentence.

“In the wake of the revelation that $34 million was transferred from taxpayer wallets into the coffers of far-left media outlet Politico . . . “

Can we please agree these federal taxpayer funds were not “transferred”? They were laundered. Let’s use the correct term.

Concerned Patriot
3 hours ago
Fired is not enough, For this level of insane corruption people need to go to jail.

Now do you see why the Dems were so afraid of Trump? All the screeching and all the theatrics, all the lawfare and the assassination attempts, it was all to prevent this day from happening. And we haven't even gotten to the really good stuff yet. Just imagine all the shenanigans waiting to be uncovered over at Medicare and Medicaid. The Dems are screwed and they don't know what to do. who's gonna vote for them after this? We already see their own constituents tune them out as they faux rage over this.

The people have woke up. Now everyone knows the Dems have been full of feces the whole time. It was never about making things better or serving the down trodden. It was about money and power.

This has me thinking of Henry Hill in Goodfellas: "We ran everything. We paid off cops. We paid off lawyers. We paid off judges. Everybody had their hands out. Everything was for the taking. And now it's all over."