I thought it was already the ultimate affront for Donald Trump to simply declare that the government has a new department when he announced that Elon Musk would be heading up DOGE — the Department of Government Efficiency.

An affront for many reasons: Number one, Republicans are supposed to be about “small government,” and creating new departments willy-nilly is the polar opposite of keeping things small. Number two, an official Department, like Treasury, Homeland Security, Veterans’ Affairs, etc., is created through an act of Congress, not presidential whim.

Number three, however, is the worst offense to me. Allowing Elon Musk unfettered access to the workings of the federal government without oversight looks like proof positive that American democracy is for sale. The $290 million that Musk coughed up during the 2024 campaign to get Trump elected seems to have paid off in dividends for the world’s richest tech bro and whiniest Space Nazi.

Letting a man who casually throws out a Nazi salute at the inauguration, just before going on to give a video address to a political party in Germany that many have compared to Nazis… Well, it reeks of Nazis. In OUR White House. That’s unthinkable.

But casually is how Musk has approached the whole thing, and he seems to simply be doing anything he wants. The latest news is that a town hall meeting hosted by Democratic Rep. Suhas Subramanyam of Virginia turned into an exposé of just how lackadaisically Musk has been approaching the traditionally secure corridors of government.

One unnamed man at the meeting spoke up very nervously.

“One of Musk’s top lieutenants and wife and young child have shacked up on the sixth floor of our agency and are living there,” the anonymous man said, adding that the hallway he worked in had “been blocked off with a special access list.”

Workers, contractors, and retirees from the federal government gathered at the town hall to air their complaints about Musk and DOGE. The primary aim of Musk’s glorified consulting position is to cut government costs through slashing budgets for programs out of favor with Trump and Republicans.

But the anonymous guy was, despite his trepidation, the loudest voice in the room. He said he learned that Musk hoped to cut his specific agency in half financially and reduce the number of employees there. He didn’t say which agency he worked for, but both the General Services Administration and the Office of Personnel Management have been discussed as places Musk was considering for drastic cuts like that, rather than the slimmer 10% cuts to other agencies and the federal government’s spending overall that is his aim.

“In the last week, we had Elon Musk in our building, and after he visited the building, called for a 50% cut of the entire agency,” the unnamed man said. “My colleagues are getting 15 minute one-on-one check-ins with 19, 20, and 21-year old-college graduates asking [them] to justify their existence.”

You know that part of the movie Office Space where Lumbergh hires The Bobs to come in and cut costs by firing people? Kind of like that.

20 year old doge investigators to the federal workforce “what would you say you do here?” pic.twitter.com/acPJmyMTgq

— Keith Peacock (@pds1607) February 5, 2025

The man said that his agency supervisors had been given a “justification form” — like a job application for a job you already have, but now are trying to keep. He said those supervisors have been told “not to tell their staff anything” about what’s going on, kind of like The Bobs just let Milton figure out on his own that he won’t be getting paid anymore.

Sorry for all the Office Space references. If you haven’t seen it, watch it. It’s funny and will explain a lot.

A Reuters report from last Sunday seems to corroborate the man’s story:

A team including current and former employees of Musk assumed command of OPM on Jan. 20, the day Trump took office. They have moved sofa beds onto the fifth floor of the agency’s headquarters, which contains the director’s office and can only be accessed with a security badge or a security escort, one of the OPM employees said.

The sofa beds have been installed so the team can work around the clock, the employee said.

Musk, a major donor to a famously demanding boss, installed beds at X for employees to enable them to work longer when in 2022 he took over the social media platform, formerly known as Twitter.

“It feels like a hostile takeover,” the employee said.

Regardless of how you feel about whether cutting costs is a worthwhile pursuit, the fact that it’s being done like this is a slap in the face to not just the people who voted for an actual government, but even the Trump supporters — who didn’t vote for Elon Musk, even if he thinks they did.