It’s just business as usual at the Department of Energy, according to Energy Secretary Chris Wright, who insisted Friday that closely guarded government secrets related to the U.S. nuclear weapons stockpile are off-limits to staffers at Elon Musk’s Department of Government Efficiency.
Wright, whose department oversees the country’s weapons stockpile, made the comments Friday in an interview with CNBC’s “Squawk on the Street,” where he attempted to brush off reports that young DOGE staffers had been handed access to the Energy Department’s sensitive IT systems this week.
“I’ve heard these rumors,” Wright told CNBC Friday. “They’re like seeing our nuclear secrets and all that. None of that is true at all. They don’t have security clearances…”
That’s when CNBC host Brian Sullivan asked: “Who are these people and what are they doing?”
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Wright explained that the DOGE team inside the department is part of Musk’s “broader circle that are very good at IT and very good at system,” who have been “checked by our security.” He added they are “just doing a critical evaluation” and compared the group to “young gun management consultants coming in to take a critical look at how things are run.”
“They don’t have anybody’s proprietary information. I know exactly who they are,” Wright said. “I think nothing to be worried about here.”
Wright’s comments came as lawmakers on Capitol Hill and some employees in the federal workforce have grown increasingly concerned over the government data that Musk and his DOGE team are dipping their hands in.
An internal government threat assessment team has determined that staffers working at DOGE should be considered an "insider threat" to sensitive government data, according to media reports.
