Department of Labor

One of AFGE’s members who works in the headquarters of the Department received an instruction from Department leadership that Elon Musk and his DOGE team would be accessing Department of Labor headquarters beginning around 4 p.m. on February 5, 2025. This member and other employees were told by Department leadership that when Mr. Musk and his team visit, they are to do whatever they ask, not to push back, not to ask questions. They were told to provide access to any DOL system they requested access to and not to worry about any security protocols; “just do it.”

DOGE staff are given access to several unspecified Department of Labor IT systems.

DOGE staffers granted authorization to use a SQL client for databases file transfer software at Department of Labor, alarming cybersecurity staff that it could be used to remove data. The staffers named are Sam Beyda, Derek Geissler, Cole Killian, Adam Ramada and Jordan Wick.

The Government Accountability Office (GAO) starts an audit of how DOGE has handled data at several agencies.

Business Insider reports Marko Elez, Aram Moghaddassi, and Miles B. Collins are new DOGE arrivals at Department of Labor.

Notes from a meeting at DOL about DOGE access state “they do not have write access. They have asked; we’ve held them at bay. We’ve tried to get them to tell us what they want & then we do it. They only have read access”

Marko Elez affirms he has completed his mandatory privacy training at the Department of Labor. This would normally be required before any system access, but he has been at the agency for several weeks.

Trump issues an executive order EO 14243 which explicitly includes an instruction that “the Secretary of Labor and the Secretary’s designees shall receive, to the maximum extent consistent with law, unfettered access to all unemployment data and related payment records, including all such data and records currently available to the Department of Labor’s Office of Inspector General.”

Luke Farritor uses his admin access to lock out all government officials at multiple agencies from using grants.gov to issue new grants. Instead, all grants must now be sent to a new email address which will be reviewed by DOGE staffers before grants can be posted.

In his new role as CIO for the Department of Labor, Thomas Shedd announces goals to reduce the department by 30% through resignations and layoffs. He also claims that DOGE is not “tracking” staff at the agency, and that all changes will be determined by focusing on results.

Multiple federal staffers who handle sensitive data related to migrant workers are placed on leave for raising objections about DOGE gaining access to those data systems to target that population for arrest and deportation.

A glimpse of Luke Farritor’s visible calendar in a Fox News DOGE profile includes a Microsoft Teams meeting with Thomas Shedd (the acting CIO and fellow GSA employee) as well as another DOL staffer to discuss grants to the agency.

A glimpse of Luke Farritor’s visible calendar in a Fox News DOGE profile includes a quick sync with a finance department deputy at the agency and a DOGE liasion.

A glimpse of Luke Farritor’s visible calendar in a Fox News DOGE profile includes a meeting with a representative from the Department of Justice and another from the FBI. (fuzz: It’s unclear what agency Farritor is representing here, but assuming it’s DOL since other events were there.)

Jerome Powell, the Chair of the Federal Reserve, expresses public concerns that DOGE-directed staffing cuts at the Bureau of Labor Statistics have started to affect the quality of economic data used for forecasting and decisions. In a recent survey on prices, the rate of imputed prices jumped from 10% to 30% due to staffing shortfalls.

In an email to agency partners, the operators of grants.gov declare that the revised mechanism added in April that routed all Notices of Funding Opportunities (NOFOs) through a DOGE email address has been reversed. Instead, agencies are to return to using the tool like that did previously. This doesn’t necessarily mean that DOGE or political appointees will not be reviewing grants, but they have no longer locked other users out of the system.

Ruling in the case AFL-CIO v. DOL, Judge Bates determines that he cannot issue a preliminary injunction that would prevent DOGE staffers from accessing sensitive systems at DOL and HHS. DOGE access was never suspended by this case.

The Bureau of Labor Statistics announces that it will have to significantly curtail its data collection for the Consumer Price Index due to staffing and resource reductions. This will result in the CPI no longer including certain products or surveying several metro areas. This triggers concerns among some economists, since the CPI is one of the factors that determines how the Federal Reserve sets interest rates or how Social Security determines cost-of-living increases.

Thomas Shedd ends his role as the temporary CIO at the Department of Labor. It is unclear who will be filling the role next.

The Bureau of Labor Statistics releases a monthly jobs report for June that radically revises down the previously released estimates for May and June by roughly 80-90% compared to prior estimates, shocking economists and Wall Street. This downward revision could reflect issues in data collection or that the economy is entering a recession. Angry at what he calls “rigged” numbers, Trump fires the head of the BLS.