Judge blocks Musk’s access to Treasury data after state lawsuits
A judge in Washington has blocked Elon Musk's newly formed efficiency team from accessing certain Treasury Department information.
This follows a lawsuit filed by a group of 19 states, mostly led by Democrats, against President Donald Trump and Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent, challenging the authorization of the team’s access, News.Az reports citing foreign media.
Trump and Bessent violated federal law by allowing the temporary Department of Government Efficiency access to Treasury Department information containing the personal data on millions of Americans, according to a lawsuit filed late Friday in New York. US District Judge Paul Engelmayer issued the blocking order early Saturday.
Engelmayer also ordered those prohibited from having access to the Treasury information but did so since January 20 to "immediately destroy any and all copies of material downloaded from the Treasury Department's records and systems." The judge set a hearing for February 14.
The case, along with a similar complaint filed earlier this week by unions, could delay what the president says is a plan to identify and cut wasteful spending.
The president created the White House's Department of Government Efficiency by executive order and appointed Musk to lead what they describe as an effort to modernise federal technology and identify spending cuts. But the move immediately raised legal concerns.
Attorneys general from states including New York and California alleged Trump and Bessent placed at risk the personal data of millions of people as well as billions of dollars in payments that states receive through the Treasury's Bureau of Fiscal Services, or BFS.
"Bessent's implementation of Treasury's new broader access policy, allowing Musk and his DOGE team to access BFS's payment systems, was adopted without any public announcement or explanation," the states argued. "Defendants have provided no reasons at all to justify the new policy, nor did Treasury conduct a privacy impact assessment prior to implementing the change."
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