Officials working with Elon Musk’s Department of Government Efficiency sought access to the U.S. Department of Treasury payment system to stop money from flowing to the U.S. Agency for International Development, according to two people familiar with the matter.
DOGE’s efforts to stop USAID payments undermine assurances that the department gave to federal lawmakers in a Tuesday letter that it sought only to review the integrity of the payments and had “read-only access” to the system as part of an audit process.
The two people familiar with the matter spoke Thursday to The Associated Press on condition of anonymity for fear of retaliation.
The actions by DOGE, a Trump administration effort to find ways to reduce the federal workforce, cut programs and slash federal regulations, have raised concerns among civil servants, Democratic lawmakers and others that Musk’s team is withholding funds appropriated by Congress to suit the president’s political agenda.
USAID, a federal agency charged with delivering humanitarian assistance overseas, has been a particular target of President Donald Trump and Musk, both of whom have argued that much of the agency’s spending is wasteful. Supporters of the agency, however, say that it is essential for national security, helping counter Russian and Chinese influence while providing humanitarian assistance across the globe.
A judge on Thursday sided with advocates and federal workers unions who sought to stop the department from giving DOGE and Musk access to the payment systems. U.S. District Judge Colleen Kollar-Kotelly restricted DOGE’s read-only access to Tom Krause, a software CEO, and Marko Elez, who reported to Krause but has since left his role at Treasury. The White House did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
The Treasury Department’s Fiscal Service conducts over 1.2 billion transactions annually and accounts for 90% of federal disbursements, including for Social Security and Medicare.
Krause, who is listed online as the CEO of Cloud Software Group, works at the department as a special government employee and is subject to less stringent rules on ethics and financial disclosures than other federal workers.
The department’s acting deputy secretary, David Lebryk, retired after more than 30 years of service when Krause and DOGE requested access to sensitive data, the two people told The AP.
Trump ordered a funding freeze at USAID his first day in office, saying, “the United States foreign aid industry” was “not aligned with American interests.” The funding freeze and subsequent stop-work orders shuttered most U.S. programs, which are worth billions of dollars and are in more than 100 countries.
While the funding freeze is supposed to last for as little as 90 days, aid workers say the damage done to aid work globally would require extensive investment and rebuilding to mend. Musk has tweeted repeated criticisms and unsubstantiated accusations about USAID as his DOGE crew dismantles much of the agency.
“Spent the weekend feeding USAID into the wood chipper,” Musk tweeted early this week.
The news that the department was trying to stop foreign aid payments was first reported by The New York Times.
