Treasury agrees to block additional DOGE staff from accessing sensitive payment systems

The Treasury Department has agreed to temporarily block all but two members of the Trump administration’s Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) team from accessing sensitive payment records and to limit their access to “read-only,” according to a Thursday court filing.

The DOGE workers allowed to continue accessing Treasury’s payment systems are Tom Krause and his employee Marko Elez, the court filing says. The order is the latest development in a lawsuit union groups filed against Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent on Monday.

The agreement comes amid an uproar over how DOGE — which is run by billionaire Elon Musk — has penetrated federal agencies and reportedly accessed or sought access to systems at the Departments of Labor and Education, the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services and the U.S. Agency for International Development, among other agencies.

The federal judge’s order formalizing the agreement will remain in place until she rules on a preliminary injunction motion filed by the plaintiffs. The injunction asks the court to require Treasury leadership to block DOGE access to the payment systems and protect the data it has already obtained.

Krause, who the lawsuit says is the CEO of a company which owns Citrix and other technology firms, is supervising Elez. Some news outlets have reported that DOGE has full access to the Treasury payment systems and has the ability to write code controlling most payments made by the federal government.

The Treasury Department has denied those claims, asserting in an unattributed letter directed to Congress and posted on the agency’s website that Elez and Krause have read-only privileges. The letter also establishes that Krause is now a Treasury employee and not merely a DOGE worker.

The letter, dated Tuesday, does not address whether non-Treasury employees working for DOGE have access to the systems. It also adds a caveat to its assertion that access is read-only by saying such access is “currently” in place and that DOGE workers “will” not have administrative privileges.

“Currently, Treasury staff members working with Tom Krause, a Treasury employee, will have read-only access to the coded data of the Fiscal Service’s payment systems in order to continue this operational efficiency assessment,” the letter says.  

“This is similar to the kind of access that Treasury provides to individuals reviewing Treasury systems, such as auditors, and that follows practices associated with protecting the integrity of the systems and business processes.”

Krause is working with longtime career Treasury employees and “all operational processes continue to be conducted only by career Treasury staff in accordance with all standard security, safety, and privacy standards,” the letter states. 

Bessent, the Treasury secretary, has been supportive of DOGE efforts. The agency’s former highest-ranking career official, David A. Lebryk, who had overseen the payment systems, reportedly retired under pressure after refusing to allow DOGE access to the payment systems.

Bessent interviewed Krause in December and discussed Krause’s plans to access Treasury systems on behalf of DOGE during that interview, Bloomberg reported Thursday.

Elez is a 25-year-old engineer who has been employed at two Musk companies, Wired reported Tuesday.

Meanwhile, another DOGE team member with access to government systems, 19-year-old Edward Coristine, worked in 2022 for a network monitoring company which has hired former “black hat” hackers, Wired reported Thursday. Coristine is reportedly known online as “Big Balls.”

Coristine is also tied to a Telegram account which “solicited a cyberattack-for-hire service,” also in 2022, Wired reported.

A former military intelligence officer and another expert who is a former FBI agent told Wired that it is doubtful Coristine could have obtained a security clearance with his background.

Clarification: The court filing containing details about the Treasury Department's plans was finalized on Thursday.