Rep. John Larson (D-CT) laid into Elon Musk Wednesday for his brief stint serving the Trump administration, calling on the Tesla CEO to be dragged in front of a House committee to testify on how Social Security data was compromised under his direction.
Musk had previously led the Department of Government Efficiency, or DOGE, in an effort to make good on President Donald Trump’s pledge to eradicate wasteful government spending. As part of that effort, Musk and his DOGE staff – many of them between the ages of 19 and 24 – copied Americans’ Social Security data to an unsecure cloud server, according to a whistleblower.
“We asked Elon Musk and DOGE to come before the [House] Ways and Means Committee, and they refused to come,” Larson said, speaking Wednesday on the House floor at the Capitol in Washington, D.C.
“Why? Because they believe they're above the law! They don't believe that they're accountable to an equal branch of government, and now they've gone in and taken the data that they were after!”
According to the whistleblower, DOGE officials under Musk put as many as 300 million Americans’ Social Security data at risk. Coincidently, around three months after Musk left his gig at the White House, a massive data breach occurred that impacted 2.9 billion records, which included names, addresses and Social Security numbers.
And now, Larson is calling not just for Musk to be brought before Congress to testify, but the whistleblower as well.
“It's long overdue, that as an equal branch of government, we hold the executive branch accountable when they are taking peoples' personal data and social security and exposing it!” Larson shouted. “There is no reason why any 24 year old, unvetted, unaccountable person should have access to any Americans' Social Security information!”
Larson said that he had asked on Tuesday to have a hearing called to provide the whistleblower an opportunity to share the extent of potential dangers created under Musk’s leadership of DOGE. As to why Musk would be interested in Social Security data, Larson argued the reason to be the most obvious one.
“Why is Elon Musk after it?” Larson said. “Because that data contains information about the $2.7 trillion of the peoples' money that's in Social Security! And if I sound a little angry, it's because I am, and every American ought to be angered and outraged that this is going on!”
