Brick by brick
Another week of taking apart what we just started putting together.
Every week really does feel like a decade, but especially the week you file your taxes. This is why a friend of mine, Merici Vinton, worked to help launch the Direct File program, making it easier for people with simplified tax returns to file their taxes online for free. People loved the program. Can you imagine people loving something to do with taxes? She and her colleagues could, and they built that.
But DOGE has other ideas. Merici wrote about the fate that awaits Direct File for the Federation of American Scientists.
And she spoke about her experience of the DOGE takeover with CNN here:
I also highly recommend this piece on the impending death of Direct File, by
:Not that public opinion counts for anything if you’re a DOGE bro, but…
A UMass-Amherst poll that came out on Tax Day shows that cuts to the IRS, Social Security, Medicare and Medicaid and other federal programs are broadly unpopular.
As they do every week, Lyn has once again brought the receipts on another week in data skullduggery. Here are the…
Headlines
Data Abused
Inside Trump’s Plan to Halt Hundreds of Regulations, Coral Davenport, The New York Times, 4/15/2025 (Archive)
The summary: mass deregulation incoming. The administration has put forth proposals to repeal or stop enforcement of rules and regulations across over 400 federal agencies.
The barrage of executive orders, DOGE’s broad interventions, swift and sweeping office cuts, immediate retraction of federal funding across agencies and institutions, and tight deadlines for Executive Order compliance all set the stage well for weakening the infrastructure upholding these rules.
Three Supreme Court rulings form the backbone of the maneuver:
West Virginia Et Al. v. Environmental Protection Agency Et Al. (2022) - limited the EPA’s ability to restrict power plant emissions
Loper Bright Enterprises v. Raimondo (2024) - ended the Chevron defense, curtailing federal agency powers to interpret and enforce laws
Heckler, Secretary Of Health And Human Services v. Chaney Et Al. (1984) - citing Justice Rehnquist’s comment that actions that are not enforced by federal agencies are then generally exempt from review of the courts.
Administration officials say they learned from the first term and prepared during Biden’s presidency to take down the “woke and weaponized” bureaucracy (language from Russell T. Vought, director of the White House Office of Management and Budget).
Agency heads soon approach the 60-day deadline to report to DOGE to identify possible targets. What’s on the chopping block? Anything that could get in the way of business opportunities, including, as The Times summarizes, “technological innovation, energy production, and private enterprise and entrepreneurship.”
What does that include? Workplace safety, transportation, health and food safety, environmental protections, firearm regulations, advertising regulations, and so much more.
Advocacy groups and opponent legislators–already scrambling–foresee rising challenges as the erosion of protective structures quickens.
See also: Delete Delete Delete and “unleash prosperity through deregulation” – the FCC posted a public notice seeking public input on deregulation targets, asking for submissions for rules to be considered for elimination.
Data Removed
A whistleblower's disclosure details how DOGE may have taken sensitive labor data, Jenna McLaughlin, NPR, 4/15/2025 (Archive)
Daniel Berulis, an IT staffer at the National Labor Relations Board, testified that there’s evidence of DOGE members accessing NLRB’s systems which house sensitive and confidential information, including possibly altered activity records, significant and abnormal data removal, and suspicious log-in activity.
NLRB’s database contains proprietary business information, information on labor organizers, and investigations of unfair labor practices. (There also just so happens to be multiple ongoing cases involving Musk’s companies).
According to the testimony, DOGE employees requested the highest access clearance while refusing having their activity tracked: an incredibly unusual and concerning cybersecurity decision. Following their appearance at the agency, evidence emerged of data removal and possible attempts at additional outside access.
Regardless of intention, the lack of insight into their activities and subsequent breach evidence makes concerns all too clear: what was DOGE doing, why were they doing it, and what holes in security may have been left open?
Less assuring, after a request was prepared for the Cybersecurity Infrastructure Security Agency to help with the formal investigation, Berulis was confronted by a threatening note on his front door which referenced him reporting the breach.
DOGE’s expansive access to sensitive information and opaque justification and impact remains a growing concern as their efforts and cosigners ring dismissive of the Privacy Act: “Across the government, 11 sources directly familiar with internal operations in federal agencies and in Congress told NPR that they share Berulis' concerns, and some have seen other evidence that DOGE is exfiltrating sensitive data for unknown reasons.”
The Trump White House is axing the wire service spot from the coverage pool, the latest salvo in its battle with the AP, Brian Stelter and Samantha Waldenberg, CNN, 4/16/2025 (Archive)
The Associated Press, Reuters, and Bloomberg News no longer have a permanent slot in the Presidential coverage press pool.
Critics describe this as an underhanded retaliation against the AP; after legal challenge, the administration was ordered by a federal judge to lift restrictions put onto the AP in disapproval of their language standard re: the Gulf Of Mexico.
“The Court simply holds that under the First Amendment, if the Government opens its doors to some journalists … it cannot then shut those doors to other journalists because of their viewpoints” ruled Judge Trevor McFadden
In response, the administration has decided that no wire service can have guaranteed access – a foreboding resolution for these outlets and the many others nationwide that do not have their own White House correspondent, and for the future of the press.
Data Threads
Fox News and others misreported (eye roll) an investigation on election integrity, sparking many such posts purporting that undocumented immigrants are stealing elections.
In reality, Arizona identified about 50 thousand registered voters that have yet to supply documents that prove citizenship, seeking assistance from the Department of Homeland Security to help verify citizenship status.
It’d be helpful if anyone would ever ask a follow up question instead of leaping to the conclusion that is most likely to get the most clicks… oh wait.
As always, don’t forget to back up your data.