"WASHINGTON -- At 12:01 p.m. on Jan. 20, as Donald Trump was being sworn in as president for the second time, programmers linked to Elon Musk's nascent government-efficiency project wanted to access computer systems within the U.S. Office of Personnel Management.
Senior officials at OPM, the government's human-resources arm, didn't help, but Musk's programmers quickly found assistance in an unlikely source: Chuck Ezell, a midlevel OPM information-technology supervisor from Georgia who had just been named acting director.
By roughly 12:30 p.m., the programmers had gained entry to a vast trove of information about the entire federal workforce.
The lightning-fast incursion at OPM took place hours before Musk's Department of Government Efficiency, or DOGE, was officially created by an executive order. It was the first salvo in what one former employee at the agency described as a "cold war" between Musk's programmers and the government's sprawling workforce.
DOGE programmers operating in the shadows of the federal bureaucracy have burrowed into computer systems across the government, including the U.S. Agency for International Development, the Treasury Department, the Internal Revenue Service and the agency overseeing Medicare and Medicaid.
DOGE's efforts have resulted in thousands of layoffs, sending shock waves through the ranks. Federal workers involved in diversity, equity and inclusion programs were among its first targets. Also fired in the name of increased efficiency: nuclear-arsenal scientists, veterans-affairs officials, healthcare researchers, national-park rangers, clean-energy experts and air-safety workers.
The drama in Washington, D.C., over the sudden, brazen influence of Musk and his band of DOGE programmers is unlike anything in the city's modern history.
"They've shaken government workers to their core," said Michigan Rep. Debbie Dingell, a Democrat. "Morale is low. People are paranoid and they're scared. I'm tired of the demonization of public employees. They're pitting people against each other."
DOGE employees, many of whom previously worked for Musk companies such as SpaceX, Tesla and Neuralink, are seen by federal workers as mortal threats to their careers and the agencies many have dedicated their lives to. Musk and Trump argue they have a mandate from voters to slash the scale of government at will. Indeed, the pair campaigned together last year and made clear Musk would have a role looking at making the government more efficient. But they had originally said DOGE would be outside the federal government, and even some top Trump advisers didn't expect Musk to have this much influence.
Harrison Fields, a White House spokesman, said DOGE "has fully integrated into the federal government to cut waste, fraud and abuse" and "will continue to shine a light on the fraud they uncover." He said many inside the government needed to get with the program.
"Rogue bureaucrats and activist judges attempting to undermine this effort are only subverting the will of the American people and their obstructionist efforts will fail," Fields said.
Musk has repeatedly provided assurances that his goal is to reduce costs and fraud across the government. At a Feb. 11 press conference in the Oval Office, Musk said DOGE's activities are "maximally transparent."
This account of DOGE's clash with the federal workforce and their efforts to take over vast swaths of the government's computer systems is based on over two dozen interviews with current and former government employees and senior officials with the Trump administration.
Inside agencies, career staff look upon the DOGE programmers with fear and suspicion. Several said they believe they're under surveillance and are careful about what they say inside government buildings. Some have taken to calling DOGE members "muskrats" and "muskovites."
Many on both sides communicate on the encrypted Signal app [1].
"The DOGE guys are distrustful of the federal government and think everyone should have to justify their jobs -- or be eliminated," said one person involved in the DOGE effort. "And the workers say: 'Who are you again?'"
Current and former government employees said DOGE programmers and their operations are cloaked in secrecy. Some believe DOGE officials have been recording group calls on the Microsoft Teams collaboration tool. Inside one agency, employees have begun checking to see whether DOGE employees still have active accounts, hoping the carnage is over. Some have begun reverse-tracking through computer systems to trace which data DOGE has accessed.
An administration official said DOGE operated in secrecy partially because they know federal employees are opposed to their efforts and would want to thwart them. There are also safety concerns. "DOGE employees will continue to do their jobs amidst violent threats in order to shine a light on the fraud they uncover," the White House said.
Musk's blitzkrieg assault on the federal government has drawn pushback, even from within the Trump administration itself. Chief of staff Susie Wiles recently asked him to provide regular updates about his plans because people in the White House have been caught by surprise, according to senior administration officials. Some cabinet officials have complained to the White House about the suddenness of DOGE's moves, other administration officials said, including unannounced incursions onto their turf and some of Musk's tweets.
Matters reached a head last weekend, when Musk said federal employees must detail their accomplishments at work or risk losing their jobs, prompting open resistance by some senior officials. Federal Bureau of Investigation Director Kash Patel told employees to "pause any response" to Musk's note. Some officials across the government including at the State, Justice, Defense and Health and Human Services departments sent similar emails to their teams, according to people familiar with the matter and messages viewed by The Wall Street Journal.
Trump moved to squelch any rebellion in the first cabinet meeting of his new term, which Musk attended. "Some disagree a little bit, but I will tell you, for the most part, I think everyone's not only happy, they're thrilled," Trump said. He added later, addressing his cabinet, "Is anyone unhappy with Elon?"
White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt said "everyone is working together as one unified team at the direction of President Trump. Any notion to the contrary is false."
Musk has an office in the White House, where he jumps into some meetings, Trump advisers say, and has begun giving Wiles thrice-weekly updates about what he is doing. But he often works from the Eisenhower Executive Office Building, steps away from the White House, where he sits with his team in a large conference room.
Musk, the world's richest person who continues to helm Tesla and SpaceX while simultaneously serving as a special government employee advising the president, oversees DOGE activities. The White House on Tuesday identified Amy Gleason, who served in the first Trump administration, as acting administrator.
Information about the size of the DOGE team hasn't been made public, and some staffers are assigned to other agencies. Others bounce around, fanning out to federal buildings across the city armed with executive authority to enter and access government computer systems, according to people familiar with their activities.
After OPM, one of DOGE's first stops was the offices of U.S. Digital Service (USDS), which provided information-technology services to federal agencies and was housed at the Eisenhower building before it was renamed the U.S. DOGE Service by the Trump administration.
On Jan. 21, dozens of staffers of the agency went to the building for meetings with Trump officials. The invitation didn't say who they would meet.
DOGE employees peppered them with questions about their job performance and who they believed were strong members of the USDS team -- and who was not.
At OPM's nondescript headquarters a few minutes' walk from the White House, DOGE workers have installed themselves on the fifth floor. They often arrive late in the day and stay late into the night. Security officers use printed photos to determine which career OPM staffers are allowed access to the inner sanctum, according to a former senior official at the agency.
Even before Trump took office, Musk's team identified OPM as central to its plans. His team moved swiftly to implement a plan that had been in the works for weeks to begin culling workers with the help of Ezell, the OPM official based in Georgia who was named acting director even though most senior officials there hadn't heard of him.
Ezell said in a recent interview with a Presbyterian magazine that he received a call from one of Trump's advisers a few months ago, which led to meetings with officials from the incoming administration.
"All the sudden, I was offered the opportunity to serve as the acting director of OPM," he said. "I humbly accepted."
Days after accessing the computer systems on Jan. 20, DOGE programmers sent an ultimatum to federal workers -- quit now and get months of paid leave or face the possibility of getting fired. The message had the subject line "Fork in the Road" -- the same subject line Musk had used in a 2022 email to Twitter employees shortly after he took over the company and renamed it X.
OPM itself has faced a wave of layoffs. At 2 p.m. on Feb. 13, a group of OPM workers at the agency's headquarters gathered. A half-hour later, Ezell, in a prerecorded video, informed them they were being terminated as of 3 p.m. "I know that this is not the outcome that you had hoped for, but I encourage you to use this as an opportunity for your next step forward," Ezell said, according to a recording heard by the Journal.” [2]
1. Signal is a free, open-source messaging app that uses end-to-end encryption to keep your communications private. You can use it to:
Send texts, photos, videos, voice messages, stickers, GIFs, and files
Make encrypted voice and video calls
Participate in group chats with up to 1,000 people
Share Stories that disappear after 24 hours
React with emojis during a call
Signal is available on Android and iOS devices. You can download it from the App Store or Google Play.
Signal's privacy features
Signal is free and has no ads, trackers, or affiliate marketers
Signal uses your phone's data connection, so you avoid SMS and MMS fees
Signal's open-source Signal Protocol means that no one can read your messages or listen to your call.
2. Inside DOGE's Federal Takeover --- A surprise incursion, shrouded in secrecy; 'rogue bureaucrats' fight back. Patterson, Scott; Dawsey, Josh; Schwartz, Brian. Wall Street Journal, Eastern edition; New York, N.Y.. 01 Mar 2025: A1.
