As a non-American: What's illegal here?

My understanding is this is DOGE getting some analysis software in place so they can find out where the money goes and start their cuts, which I understand there is an executive order for. And my understanding is that the executive does have the power to do that sort of audit.

Where has my understanding gone wrong?

I am also a non-American so yes, I would like to see your question answered too.

My understanding from online reading (... but we know how that goes ...) is that that executive order cannot be given without approval and that approval was not given. But would love to hear someone with more knowledge to chime in as all the left-ish to even moderate right media are shouting all of this is illegal and overstepping.

As a non-american, my feeling is that it’s just about who signs the order.

If Biden creates a new program by executive order and puts a non elected person in charge, republicans will cry. If Trump does the same, democrats will yell.

It’s just the polarisation of the debate that is higher than before.

I thought so, but they seem have a lot of issues explaining it in a way that makes it seem on the up. On all sides.

Handling personal information of citizens is subject to a lot of laws and protections. You can’t just put whatever software installed by whomever.

It's probably legal, but we will find out in court.

You are pretty much correct. There is a ton of partisan vitriol that is currently obscuring the facts. My understanding is that Elon Musk is an advisor to the president, but not a government employee. Musk and his crew are given authority to do pretty much whatever they want in terms of cutting employees and programs, so long as Trump signs off on it. Is it legal? Probably, but nothing like this has ever been done before. You can very easily see it as private citizens with no official government power taking away power from more legitimate government employees.

Potentially quite a lot, although it is hard to tell with how fast they have been moving and the dubious legal claims they have been making to support it.

DOGE is not a department authorized by Congress to exist. Elon's appointment at the head of it was not confirmed by Congress, usurping its right to 'advise and consent' to the executive. All government employees have strict rules they have to follow about conflicts of interest, which Elon's companies many government contracts would put him in violation of. Congress dictates what and how the government spends its money, and the Executive is tasked with carrying that out; Elon has placed himself in the middle of that, and has been saying he will now be the one that chooses how that money is spent. There are many laws in place on how the government is to handle personal information, and there is no indication or oversight of DOGE to verify those laws are being followed. Elon was locking employees out of their workplace, despite having that authority (since he was not confirmed to Congress to be in charge of that department).

There are probably quite a lot of other ones too. A lot of the strategy seems to be moving faster than the courts can keep up.

Apart from the fact that the analysis software is being installed on insecure computers, to ingest the PII of employees and of Treasury transactions, by people with security clearance granted at the last minute:

The cuts are already preceding the actual analysis, and once the authority of the executive to do whatever they have done is decided in court, the damage will have been done. It is the “stop me if you can, I’ll be done before the Supreme Court stops me” approach that is terrifying.

> Or are they picked because they are young and gullible and easily manipulated

bingo, take developing minds with high risk tolerance to do the illegal work someone older and wiser would refuse.

Smart? Maybe. Wise? Definitely not.