Quickwint Sidelong Blur, 48th Day of Childwinter, 525 M.E. (Helios): According to a headline article in today's Guardian, Trump’s flurry of executive orders expanding his presidential powers, coupled with Musk's DOGGIE (Department of Government Inefficiency) campaign to cut billions of dollars in federal spending through massive job cuts, amount to a coup, plain and simple, and are a threat to American democracy.  

Welcome to the struggle, comrades. 

Claims that Trump and Musk are going after waste, fraud and abuse are just a smokescreen for their real intentions. Even though Trump has praised DOGGIE’s cost cutting as vital to curbing spending, one of his first moves in office was to fire 17 Inspectors General, veteran agency watchdogs whose very jobs are to ferret out waste, fraud, and abuse in federal departments. The firings occurred despite laws protecting IGs passed by Congress less than three years ago, and were done without giving Congress the legally required 30-days’ notice and specific justifications for each firing.

The IG for USAID was fired almost immediately after he had issued a highly critical report warning of serious economic repercussions of the sweeping job cuts that DOGGIE had made. The agency’s mission is to provide humanitarian aid and fund assistance and tech projects in developing countries, but Musk has called USAID a “criminal organization” and an “arm of the criminal left globalists." 

In response to their firings, eight of the IGs, including ones from the Departments of Defense, Education, and Health and Human Services, filed a lawsuit seeking reinstatement, arguing their terminations violated federal laws designed to protect them from interference with their jobs. 

The DOGGIE operations and the IG firings are blatant examples of executive power overreach. The Guardian quotes Senator Sheldon Whitehouse (D-RI), as likening Trump’s firing of the IGs to firing cops before you rob a bank. Whitehouse said, “It’s pretty clear that what’s going on here is a very deliberate effort to create as much wreckage in the government as they can manage with a view to helping out the big Trump donors and special interests who find government obnoxious in various ways.”

Nineteen state Attorney Generals have sued to halt DOGGIE from accessing sensitive documents with details about tens of millions of Americans who get Social Security checks, tax refunds, and other payments, arguing that DOGGIE was violating the Administrative Procedures Act. The lawsuit prompted a New York judge to issue a temporary order halting DOGGIE from accessing the Treasury payments system.

Musk and Trump lashed back by charging judicial interference. On Twitter, Musk claimed the judge was corrupt and that he should be impeached "NOW.” Trump agreed, saying, “It seems hard to believe that a judge could say, ‘We don’t want you to do that,’ so maybe we have to look at the judges because I think that’s a very serious violation.” As Arizona’s Attorney General, Kris Mayes, said, “In the US, we appeal rulings we disagree with – we don’t ignore court orders or threaten judges with impeachment just because we don’t like the decision. 

"This is a coup, plain and simple,” he claimed. 

Trump’s and Musk’s charges of improper judicial interference and other actions pose dangers to the rule of law and the US Constitution. Trump has not only granted Musk and DOGGIE extraordinary power over federal agency operations with little public oversight and accountability, but he also violated the constitution’s appointments clause by establishing DOGGIE without Congressional approval.

The president is openly violating the Constitution by taking power from Congress and handing it to an unelected billionaire. Under our constitutional separations of powers, each co-equal branch of government serves as a check on the others. Yet congressional Republicans seem more than willing to cede their constitutional powers in service of Trump and Musk’s political agenda. 

The American people are being gaslighted by Trump and Musk. There's no evidence DOGGIE actually discovered billions of dollars of waste, fraud, abuse, and corruption. If they had, they would have provided the specifics. But they can’t provide them and they won’t. At worst, what they might have seen ae some things that might raise some questions, but they haven’t bothered to seek explanations from anyone with relevant knowledge.

As the CEO of Tesla and SpaceX, Musk has received billions of dollars in federal contracts. As a “special government employee” Musk’s post is a temporary position that bypasses the disclosure requirements for full-time federal employees. Without giving up his many private-sector roles, he is clearly in a conflict of interest as he wrecks the various agencies that have oversight of aspects of his business operations and as Trump removes the IGs who might find fault with the contracts the government hands out to Musk's companies.

Musk, in addition to claims of being the world's richest man, was also Trump's biggest campaign donor. Quid pro quo much, gentlemen?