DOGE employees ordered to stop using Slack

Original Article ↗ Hacker News Discussion ↗

FOIA, Slack, and Recordkeeping Status

  • Several commenters say the key move isn’t “Slack vs not-Slack” but shifting DOGE from under OMB to being a “presidential component” under the Presidential Records Act (PRA).
  • Under that interpretation, DOGE records would be PRA, not Federal Records Act, meaning they would generally not be FOIA-accessible until years after the president leaves office.
  • Others note a former National Archives official expects this status to be litigated, with courts deciding if DOGE is really just presidential advice or an oversight-like agency.
  • Some argue FOIA often fails in practice anyway because hostile agencies can stonewall or overuse exemptions.

Legality of DOGE and Presidential Powers

  • One camp says DOGE itself is legal: created via executive order by repurposing USDS and structured as a temporary organization authorized under existing statute.
  • Another camp argues that what DOGE is doing (e.g., de facto shutting down or freezing agencies like USAID, mass spending pauses) likely violates Congress’s “power of the purse” and anti‑impoundment rules.
  • There’s detailed back‑and‑forth over whether freezing or redirecting funds constitutes unlawful impoundment, and whether the president can abolish or “transform” agencies established in statute.
  • Some distinguish DOGE (advisory) from the president (who signs EOs and bears legal responsibility), others counter that advisors selected to match the president’s agenda blur that line.

Transparency, Oversight, and Authoritarian Drift

  • Many see moving DOGE communications out of immediate FOIA reach and off Slack as a direct attempt to avoid accountability, especially given DOGE’s role in sweeping government changes.
  • Commenters connect this to a broader pattern: fire or disable inspectors general, overwhelm courts with rapid changes, then rely on slow litigation to normalize overreach.
  • Comparisons are drawn to “self‑coup” dynamics and pre‑authoritarian transitions; others stress this is the predictable exploitation of long‑existing constitutional and procedural holes.

DOGE’s Role, Access, and Civil Service Purge Concerns

  • Reports that DOGE is locking people out of systems and even modifying code lead some to claim it is acting less like an auditor and more like an operational authority.
  • Multiple comments frame DOGE as a tool to purge “uncooperative” civil servants and hollow out agencies by creating chaos so people quit and positions remain unfilled.
  • Others emphasize that, formally, DOGE only investigates and recommends; the president (and agency heads) execute actual changes.

Alleged Corruption and Spending Examples

  • Supporters point to DOGE‑amplified “receipts”: large federal grants to NGOs (e.g., religious refugee/child services), foreign aid projects (e.g., reproductive health in Gaza), and Politico Pro subscriptions, calling them corruption or partisan slush.
  • Critics respond that:
    • Much of this looks like standard humanitarian, soft‑power, or information‑service spending.
    • The Politico story in particular is mostly about agencies buying subscription data; USAID’s direct funding to Politico appears relatively small.
    • Musk and allies selectively highlight numbers without context, in a reprise of the “Twitter Files” style: big insinuations first, details and corrections later (if ever).

System Design, Checks and Balances, and Political Polarization

  • Several discuss structural issues: filibuster‑driven Senate paralysis, gerrymandering, two‑party lock‑in, and a judiciary slow or unwilling to constrain a determined executive.
  • Some argue the US system assumed “good faith” and restraint; once a president and party reject those norms, the legal architecture is easily abused.
  • There are calls for deeper reforms, even suggestions of a constitutional convention, versus resignation that both recent parties have stretched legality.

Slack, Alternatives, and Data Control

  • Separate from FOIA, some question why sensitive government work ever used Slack, given data sits on a third‑party’s servers.
  • Others note government Slack instances have been treated as fully FOIA‑able, with all content presumptively disclosable.
  • Side discussion debates Slack vs Teams vs Discord vs Rocket.Chat in cost, UX, and suitability for long‑term knowledge; many prefer Slack but acknowledge its expense and centralization.

Public and Emotional Reactions

  • The thread shows sharp polarization: some call DOGE “obviously illegal” and urge boycotts of Musk companies; others claim it is “obviously legal,” popular, and exposing entrenched corruption.
  • A recurring worry: either DOGE reflects a massive unlawful power grab, or it exposes enormous unguarded backdoors in US governance; both are seen as alarming.