{"id":176008,"date":"2025-12-05T05:37:10","date_gmt":"2025-12-05T05:37:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/176008\/"},"modified":"2025-12-05T05:37:10","modified_gmt":"2025-12-05T05:37:10","slug":"former-usip-lawyer-on-doge-brass-knuckles-on-an-authoritarian-fist","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/176008\/","title":{"rendered":"Former USIP Lawyer on DOGE: \u2018Brass Knuckles on an Authoritarian Fist\u2019"},"content":{"rendered":"

George Foote still has vivid memories of the day operatives from Elon Musk\u2019s so-called Department of Government Efficiency<\/a> arrived at the headquarters of the United States Institute of Peace<\/a>. The outside general counsel for USIP, he\u2019s been part of the effort to keep the US government from seizing<\/a> control of the organization. When DOGE operatives arrived at the USIP offices in the spring they came in like a \u201cstrike team,\u201d Foote told the audience at WIRED\u2019s Big Interview event on Thursday in San Francisco.<\/p>\n

The DOGE team, Foote said, left behind a \u201chalf-pound of weed\u201d\u2014more probably, a fellow panelist noted, a half-ounce\u2014and ultimately seemed to have \u201cno idea what to do with the place.\u201d It was, Foote said, indicative of a lot of the work of DOGE, which \u201carrived as the brass knuckles on an authoritarian fist.\u201d He added that he wasn\u2019t sure what Musk wanted to do with DOGE, \u201cbut he took it to a destructive level.\u201d<\/p>\n

The Trump administration\u2019s interest in the independent agency dates back to a February 19 executive order<\/a> declaring the agency \u201cunnecessary\u201d and calling for it to be eliminated. In March, the administration fired the 10 voting board members of the USIP, and according to court filings<\/a>, tried to enter the headquarters but were turned away. In court documents, lawyers for the agency detailed a series of attempts by DOGE to enter the $500 million building<\/a> before its operatives eventually succeeded. Ultimately, a judge ruled<\/a> that DOGE and the US government didn\u2019t have the right to take control of USIP and its headquarters.<\/p>\n

Still, this week Trump\u2019s name was installed on<\/a> the headquarters of USIP ahead of the signing of a peace agreement between Rwanda and the Democratic Republic of the Congo at the building. The signing was \u201cheld there because the president wants to assert control over the building,\u201d said Foote, who is currently representing USIP directors in a lawsuit challenging Trump\u2019s right to remove them from office.<\/p>\n

Foote was one of several people on a panel, hosted by WIRED senior writer Vittoria Elliott, on the fallout from the move-fast-break-things ethos of DOGE. Foote was joined by former Social Security Administration commissioner Leland Dudek, and former DOGE engineer Sahil Lavingia, who announced during the panel that he\u2019s back in government<\/a> at the Internal Revenue Service.<\/p>\n

As WIRED reported<\/a> on Tuesday, many of the young technologists<\/a> DOGE sent to various US agencies are still working with federal government entities. Edward \u201cBig Balls\u201d Coristine<\/a>, Akash Bobba<\/a>, Ethan Shaotran<\/a>, Marko Elez<\/a>, and Gavin Kliger<\/a> all still seem affiliated with DOGE or the US government. DOGE has \u201cjust transformed,\u201d one IRS employee told WIRED.<\/p>\n

As the effects of DOGE ripple out, Foote noted, it\u2019s important for people to keep an eye on what\u2019s happening. He\u2019s confident the USIP directors will win in court, even if the process is long. \u201cThe rule of law doesn\u2019t matter if the people don\u2019t stand up to defend it,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"George Foote still has vivid memories of the day operatives from Elon Musk\u2019s so-called Department of Government Efficiency…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":176009,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[31091,969,605,1523,61,60,1650,80,96124],"class_list":{"0":"post-176008","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-technology","8":"tag-doge","9":"tag-donald-trump","10":"tag-elon-musk","11":"tag-government","12":"tag-ie","13":"tag-ireland","14":"tag-politics","15":"tag-technology","16":"tag-the-big-interview-event"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/176008","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=176008"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/176008\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/176009"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=176008"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=176008"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=176008"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}