Throughout the early months of this Trump presidency, Mr. Musk and his allies systematically built a false narrative of widespread fraud at the Social Security Administration based on misinterpreted data, using their claims to justify an aggressive effort to gain access to personal information on millions of Americans, a New York Times investigation has found.
At Social Security, Mr. Musk’s efforts amount to a case study in what happened when his team of government novices ran a critical government agency through misinformation and social media blasts.
DOGE leaders pressured agency executives to hire a 21-year-old former intern at Palantir, a data analysis and technology firm, and grant him access to the personal data of every Social Security cardholder despite the executives’ concerns that he lacked sufficient training to handle such sensitive information.
Mr. Musk’s deputies became so intent on their work at Social Security that they pushed employees to continue giving them access to sensitive agency data even after a federal judge demanded that DOGE’s access be cut off, according to two people familiar with the events. The Supreme Court ruled this month that DOGE’s access can resume.
In early February, a DOGE team stationed at the Treasury Department gained access to crucial federal data: the payments the Treasury processed on behalf of government agencies.
Inside that system, DOGE members saw taxpayer funds flowing to people who appeared not to have Social Security numbers, according to an internal memo viewed by The Times and people briefed on DOGE’s analysis of the Treasury data. Other recipients seemed to be dead.
None of it was evidence of wrongdoing, Social Security employees would later explain to DOGE. Mr. Musk’s team simply did not understand the data. But on X, Mr. Musk suddenly began accusing the agency of enabling “massive fraud,” saying in a flurry of posts starting Feb. 9 that Social Security payments had been going to scammers and “illegals.”
Mr. Dudek, expressing skepticism, suggested that agency employees could analyze the data. Dozens of Social Security employees were then given instructions to scrutinize the Treasury data and investigate DOGE’s suspicions, according to four people with knowledge of the process.
In the extensive analysis that followed, agency experts carefully documented fallacies in DOGE’s work, according to documents reviewed by The Times and those people.
“These payments are valid,” Sean Brune, an acting deputy commissioner, wrote in a memo examining one of the issues. (A Treasury spokeswoman declined to comment.)
But [Michael Russo, a former payments processing executive who had been installed as the new chief information officer and described himself as a member of DOGE], who did not respond to a request for comment, said that DOGE would not trust career civil servants, according to people familiar with his statements. Instead, he insisted that Akash Bobba — a 21-year-old who had interned at Palantir and become one of DOGE’s lead coders — conduct his own analysis.
To do that, Mr. Bobba would need to gain access to the personal data Social Security kept on Americans. That could include the identifying nine-digit numbers, names, addresses, dates and places of birth, citizenship and benefit amounts, as well as other sensitive information.
Mr. Dudek faced another crisis on March 20, when a federal judge issued an order prohibiting Mr. Musk’s team from entering Social Security databases that contained personally identifying information.
By this point, Mr. Dudek had granted such access to at least six DOGE members, including Mr. Bobba, court records show.
On the night of the ruling, two DOGE leaders told Mr. Dudek that the agency should continue allowing access to the data despite the judge’s order, with one arguing that the order was so ambiguous that it could block all Social Security employees, not just members of DOGE, from gaining access, according to a person familiar with events.
Mr. Dudek responded to DOGE’s arguments by going public with a stunning declaration seemingly designed to encourage the judge to more clearly reiterate her ruling. Given the order’s vagueness, he told reporters, he might have to shut down the systems used for the agency’s work.
“I believe that the two checks on the executive branch are the courts and the Constitution,” he told The Times on March 21, essentially endorsing the idea that the court act as a guardrail for decisions being made at the agency he ostensibly led.
The judge quickly sent two letters reiterating that her order applied only to members of DOGE. The agency’s work continued.
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