Judge Halts Access to Treasury Payment Systems by Elon Musk's Team

[iemanja]

Source: New York Times

A federal judge early Saturday temporarily restricted access by Elon Musk’s government efficiency program to the Treasury Department’s payment and data systems, saying there was a risk of “irreparable harm.”

The Trump administration’s new policy of allowing political appointees and “special government employees” access to these systems, which contain highly sensitive information such as bank details, heightens the risk of leaks and of the systems becoming more vulnerable than before to hacking, U.S. District Judge Paul A. Engelmayer said in an emergency order.

Judge Engelmayer ordered any such official who had been granted access to the systems since Jan. 20 to “destroy any and all copies of material downloaded from the Treasury Department’s records and systems.” He also restricted the Trump administration from granting access to those categories of officials.

The defendants — President Trump, Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent and the Treasury Department — must appear on Feb. 14 before Judge Jeannette A. Vargas, who is handling the case on a permanent basis, Judge Engelmayer said.

Read more: https://www.nytimes.com/2025/02/07/nyregion/attorneys-general-trump-musk-suit.html

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That's the entire article.

At last, good news!

[elleng]

1. Very good news!!!

[Pas-de-Calais]

2. Make permanent & I may be happy

[angrychair]

3. What is Congress doing?

They have oversight. A judge barring access should sound alarm bells in the oversight committee but they are still obsessed with the previous administration and tilting at windmills.
I truly feel like I'm in an insane asylum and I've lost track of who is staff and who are the patients.

[iemanja]

4. The Republicans are perfectly happy to go along

They've completely abandoned their constitutional responsibilities.

[bluestarone]

5. I would feel 100% better if,

This judge would ORDER a 24 hour monitor at the main door to the Treasury dept.

[japple]

6. I fear the damage has already been done. It will take a lot to

recover from this.

[iemanja]

7. I wonder if Musk will obey the order

The administration may be looking for another chance to defy the courts in order to solidify the imperial presidency/dictatorship.

[Scrivener7]

10. Yes. This might be too late.

[SergeStorms]

8. My thoughts exactly.

Eloon and his fan-boys have all the information they need, I fear. They can disect all the information they stole and develop a program or plant a virus that can be uploaded anywhere. I'm sure Eloon and his henchmen are giddy with anticipation because of all the chaos they can level upon the American people.

[hueymahl]

9. I'm afraid this will be overturned

As the legal basis is very, very shakey. But hopefully it will buy us some time to put a real plan in place.

[iemanja]

12. How is it shaky?

[hueymahl]

15. It over-reaches by restricting constitutional authority of the executive branch

If I am reading it correctly (and maybe I am not), it applies not only to DOGE (which will likely be upheld, in my opinion), but also to the the Secretary of the Treasury himself, which, again in my opinion, is likely unconstitutional.

But we will see!

https://fingfx.thomsonreuters.com/gfx/legaldocs/myvmbzdenpr/02082025doge_order.pdf

[HereForTheParty]

11. And if Trump defies the order?

How is it enforced?

[iemanja]

13. That's it

No one, and I think they are looking for an opportunity to defy the courts. They’ve already defied the stay on the freeze on domestic funding.

[dickthegrouch]

14. Several things missing from that order

Restoration of all systems to prior states.
Replacement of any data deleted, with penalties per megabyte for any data that cannot be restored.
Lockdown of all security protocols and changes to credentials for the most senior career admins, with changes to security protocols allowed only by them in conjunction with the court in the future.

I’m sure other cybersecurity experts can add other meaningful protections here.

[Johnny999r]

16. Theft of confidential treasury files

OK, a federal judge has ordered the Musk clown show to destroy the secret Treasury documents they stole recently. How can anyone trust Trump to advise his real boss Musk to carryout said federal judges order? Trump, as he had dealt with stolen secret/top secret documents more than likely revealed said documents as leverage or for side money from one or more of our adversaries. No doubt in my mind he divulged or revealed secret USA information now and before, just based on his ignorant excuse he personaly declassified them previously. In accordance to Trump's style, He waved his almighty Trump wand and made the declaration. First, He scratched his ass with a big garden rake and declared "I, Donald Trump hereby unsecret these papers that were written by the criminal Democrats". He thinks since he is allegedly the President, he has the power to make rules or break them without cause.

The problem I have with the judge's order to Musk and Trump to destroy the documents is how do we know or prove they have done so? I would never/ ever trust Trump's word. Everytime he opens his flytrap, what comes out is likely a lie or massive embellishment. The documents have likely been copied already and the two lunatics are now arguing as to who will be the highest bidder for them. Fortunately, there are still some conservative and truthful federal judges on the bench. So far, they have resisted Trump's coup attempts with his insane number of stupidly based executive orders.