Elon Musk's government efficiency is moving fast and breaking the law.
Trump and Musk's drastic efforts to wipe out federal workforce and reduce government spending have shocked the political world because of their ambitions, but some ignore the law. is.
David Super, a professor of administrative law at Georgetown Law School, recently said that many of the mask movements are “very illegal” and that “it appears to be playing a quantitative game and the system cannot respond to everything.” He told the Washington Post that it appears to be a hypothesis. This illegality is at once.”
I reached out to the supermarket so he could walk this quantity game. He has been able to take him on all the tours of the obvious law in the mask effort so far. Condensed and edited transcriptions of conversations are followed for clarity.
Legality used by masks to sideline civil servants using managed leave
So far, one of the things that really hit me about the new administration's tactics is the use of this very aggressive paid administrative leave. Career staff who resisted Doge's request were placed on administrative leave immediately. So did government officials working on Day. Almost every staff member at USAID, the US International Development Agency, meets its fate.
Is this a legal use of administrative leave? How do regular administrators use it?
This is very strange and illegal. Federal law limits administrative leave to 10 business days a year. Therefore, they run out of caps very quickly for many of these people.
A regular administrator uses it in the way that a regular business uses it as a patch for various issues. If someone has been accused of fraud, it takes time to investigate and the problem is serious, administrative leave can be the solution. This can be done if someone clearly needs a break for a compelling reason, such as a big loss, and there is no way to do it on other forms of vacation. So it is a bit of a gap filler in statute, intentional, and normal use.
It is used strategically on a large scale and has no legal authority to do so.
The administration also sent a “fork on the road” email saying that if a civil servant agreed to resign, he would take administrative leave until September 30th and be paid full salary. What are the legal issues there?
Well, they have promises that go against federal law – and it has very serious consequences.
The Constitution's Expenditures Clause states that federal funds can only be spent in accordance with Congress's budget, and Congress can limit their spending in any way. They generally limit their payroll budgets to 10 days of administrative leave per calendar year.
So when they promise to be more, they are violating the budget clause. They also violate the anti-efficiency laws [a law prohibiting federal employees from committing funds that haven’t been appropriated]. And when they make money promises to those who have passed March 14th, the end of the current ongoing resolution, they are also committed to federal funds before the budget that is unconstitutional and unlawful. .
They seem to think of it as a “hack.” They probably think it's legally dangerous to fire people, but taking paid administrative leave is a step closer to that, and perhaps they can get away.
Well, one question is whether they actually do that. They certainly promise it. But they also suggest that they may not be bound by the contract.
Therefore, it is very likely that people will submit their resignation based on this, that OPM [Office of Personnel Management] Sign a committing agreement and then simply disobey and argue that it cannot be legally complied due to the administrative leave limit.
At that point, those who were stupid enough to take this invitation may plead to enforce their deal. And my guess is that the courts cannot execute a transaction that no one had the authority to do.
Congress asserts presidential authorities to avoid spending money handed over to the law
It's okay, let's move on to spending. We have seen a very broad order on freezing federal grants pending by courts. There were also talks about mask teams trying to block certain grants. What are the legal issues related to that?
Well, the biggest problem is that the Supreme Court ruled nothing that the President had an obligation to do that when Congress instructed him to spend money. It is a very difficult obstacle for them to overcome.
The president can certainly send recommendations to Congress that funds should be cut. Water storage management methods provide quick steps to consider these recommendations. However, the president simply does not have this one-sided authority.
The Trump administration has come up with many distant legal theories about why they can do all this. But these legal theories come from the same place as the idea that the Vice President has the power to overturn public judgments in presidential elections and give elections to those whom the Vice President has the power to give elections. It was an absurd theory when they tried to persuade Mr. Pence to do it, and it has been a ridiculous theory ever since. But the ideas that we are appearing here come from the same very strange form of strange constitutional ideas.
Trump and Musk are about to disband USAID and move to the State Department. This seems blatantly rebellious against the face of the laws of the Congress that creates that institution, right? Is it more complicated than that?
That's not really the case. Section 6563(a) of the US Code title 22 states that there is a USAID. I'm not saying it's there. I'm not saying, “If the president wants.” I say it's there teeth USAID. So closing it means it is against that law.
Musk's own appointment and the Ministry of Finance's payment system
I would also like to ask about Elon Musk himself and his position in the government. The administration says he is a special civil servant, but they haven't said exactly when he has achieved that position. They say that That's up to him Whether to declare a conflict of interest regarding what he is working on with his business. What are the legal issues here?
Well, there are a lot of such issues. There are many integrity rules designed to keep people who control the strings of their wallets from the government doing business.
I don't know what Musk's position is. I don't know if he has status at all or if they're waiting to see what happens. They try to provide it retroactively to him. So we are at a very loss as to how all of this comes together. However, he appears to be given access to information that is extremely useful to use against his competitors. “Well, I hope he does the right thing about conflicts of interest,” and it's far beyond the government's obligations.
There have been many reports of Musk and his team entering the Treasury payment system. What is the legal red flag about it?
There are many of them. Federal law has very elaborate requirements for who has control over federal funds. He is someone who can issue payments on behalf of the federal government. Perhaps the parties involved are not qualified under these conditions.
It also means that you have access to highly sensitive personal information subject to privacy laws and many other laws and regulations designed to protect American citizens from theft. If they report that they have copied this information to other servers, then if those servers are hacked, many of us can empty our bank accounts by the federal government.
In contrast, Musk has identified false or illegal payments and has told the federal government that he saves $4 billion a day or a huge number of that kind. There is no reason to believe that the data in this system can tell you what is legal and what is legal. Put aside the fact that Musk is not permitted to make such a decision. So it seems like there's hopeful thinking or even worse going on about what they're trying to justify this.
(Update: After this conversation, the Trump administration I agreed to temporary restrictions About access to Doge's Ministry of Finance payment system. )
Will the court stop this?
Are there any other areas of blatant litigation that I have failed to mention?
He says he has the authority to repeal federal regulations without the necessary procedures under the Management Procedures Act. It fundamentally overturns the country's regulatory regime and can be very unsettling for regulated businesses. If another president decides to use that reported power, I think both the Liberals and the conservatives are very concerned about the proposal.
You put the Washington Post on the “quantity game” of bets that if they blatantly deny many laws at the same time, the system cannot handle what they are doing or respond effectively. He said he thought he was playing. What do you think it's been working for them so far?
Fundraising has been banned. Many of these other moves are illegal and will likely be banned quite quickly.
But I think President Trump has followed a statement that he has made many times that his appointment to the Supreme Court should be held accountable and show loyalty. Have a majority willing to allow him to violate federal laws he desires.
