gotchanewsdaily.com 
Attorneys for the Justice Department have reportedly agreed to temporarily limit tech billionaire Elon Musk’s so-called Department of Government Efficiency from accessing the Treasury Department’s payment system.
The agreement, reported by NBC News, comes after union members and retirees sued the Treasury Department, saying that giving such access to the payment and collections system, as well as the large amount of Americans’ data in it, violated federal privacy laws.
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The Trump administration asked a court Wednesday night to enter a proposed order detailing the terms, according to the report.
“The Defendants will not provide access to any payment record or payment system of records maintained by or within the Bureau of the Fiscal Service,” the proposed order said.
Two special government workers at the department would be allowed exceptions to the rule “as needed” to perform their duties, according to the proposed order, “provided that such access to payment records will be ‘read only.'”
Experts have raised concerns about Musk’s access to the system.
Donald K. Sherman, executive director and chief counsel of the watchdog group Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington, told CBS MoneyWatch that there is “no community of Americans that this system does not touch, and so I think the concern is that access to this system including personally identifiable information has been ceded to the president’s billionaire friend for reasons that are passing understanding.”
There are “quite real risks” that DOGE “could potentially undermine that system and threaten millions of Americans from getting payments that they are due,” he added.
Democrats have echoed those concerns.
“Controlling the system could allow the Trump Administration to ‘unilaterally’ — and illegally — cut off payments for millions of Americans, putting at risk the financial security of families and businesses based on political favoritism or the whims of Mr. Musk and those on his team who have worked their way inside,” Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-MA) wrote in a Feb. 2 letter to new Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent.
