A federal judge has indicated that she will issue an injunction forbidding members of the DOGE team, which is part of the Executive Office of the Presidency, from reviewing some financial records.
During the hearing, a lawyer from the Department of Justice disclosed that two “special government employees” associated with Musk, but employed by the Treasury Department, accessed sensitive records from the Bureau of the Fiscal Service based on “high level guidance” from the Department of Government Efficiency to prevent waste and fraud.
The hearing followed a lawsuit filed by three federal unions that alleged DOGE employees violated federal privacy laws when they accessed data from the Treasury Department, including the names, social security numbers, birthdays, bank account numbers, and addresses of taxpayers, as part of DOGE’s effort to trim the size of the federal government under President Donald Trump.
It is apparent that some parts of the judiciary are recreating the bad old days of 2017 when there was a concerted effort by a fairly large number of federal judges to stymie President Trump’s agenda. The ruling seems bizarre given the fetish the judicial community had about “standing” when protecting Joe Biden. It is difficult to see how the plaintiffs — the American Federation of Government Employees, the Service Employees International Union, and the Alliance for Retired Americans — can show how they have any role in this case. There is no evidence that information has been mishandled, and ultimately, the president owns the data.
However, it is no mystery why the federal unions are experiencing a debilitating bout of fecal incontinence. Trump is obviously going to run the social security numbers of federal employees against IRS data to see how many of them have used their “work at home” status over the last four years to take on a second W-2-generating job.
Kollar-Kotelly was actively hostile to Trump in his first term, and she was one of the more ruthless judges in the January 6 cases, with her petty vindictiveness reaching a pinnacle in sentencing a pro-life protester.
On May 31, Judge Colleen Kollar-Kotelly sentenced Paulette “Paula” Harlow to two years in federal prison and 36 months of supervised release for violating the Freedom of Access to Clinic Entrances Act (FACE Act) with a pro-life demonstration at an abortion clinic in 2020.
Although Harlow’s husband, John, and attorney emphasized that her rapidly declining health could put her life in jeopardy in pleading for leniency, court transcripts obtained by Fox News Digital showed the judge giving Harlow a suggestion based on Harlow’s religion.
“I would suggest that, in terms of your religion, that one of the tenets is that you should make the effort during this period of time, when it may be difficult in terms of for your husband, to make every effort to remain alive, to do the things that you need to do to survive, because that’s part of the tenets of your religion,” Kollar-Kotelly said.
If this injunction is held, it means that government unions control where the president may go in the government.
Kollar-Kotelly may be considering some arrangement where the members of President Trump’s personal staff will be allowed to look at some data elements but not all. Attorney General Pam Bondi should push back vigorously on any such limits on the personal representatives of the president.
In a sane world, the DC Circuit would make short work of any injunction. Unfortunately, the DC Circuit isn’t sane and is consumed with TDS after he pardoned the January 6 Jaywalkers. This case could very well end up before the Supreme Court.
