Special Issue: Government Updates & Health 2/8/25

Today, I am writing a special issue of my newsletter summarizing most of the actions from the Trump administration this week, including important changes at the NIH, the Treasury, USAID and other US government agencies. I will write a separate newsletter with information on respiratory viruses including COVID that I hope to post tomorrow or Monday.

USAID

The United States Agency for International Development (USAID) funds and contracts organizations to provide food, famine detection, and health programs, including polio vaccinations and pandemic prevention, across more than 60 countries.

Sunday 2/2/25, Elon Musk took over USAID and said that he was going to shut it down. He closed the building to USAID employees for Monday.

Monday 2/3/25, members of congress tried to enter USAID and were told by security that they were not allowed. Democrats from the House of Representatives and the Senate held a press conference in front of the USAID offices to speak out against Elon Musk’s illegal takeover of the agency.

Tuesday 2/4/25 The State Department announced that they would evacuate USAID staff worldwide within 4 days.

Thursday 2/6/25 Per Atul Gawande: “Rubio claims that USAID lifesaving assistance for health and humanitarian needs will continue. But his team just communicated that the entire agency will be imminently reduced from 14,000 to 294 people. Just 12 in Africa. We already see the shutdown's cost. Kids with drug-resistant TB, turned away from clinics, are not just dying - they're spreading the disease. People around the world w HIV, denied their medicine, will soon start transmitting virus. The damage is global.”

Saturday 2/8/25, a federal judge paused the administrative leave for thousands of USAID workers.

FBI

The Federal Bureau of Investigation Agents Association (FBIAA) filed a class action lawsuit against the retaliatory purge of FBI agents who worked on the January 6th insurrection case. They also filed an emergency order to block the release of the names of FBI agents to the public who had any involvement in investigations related to Trump.

CIA

The White House insisted on sending a list of CIA agents' names through unclassified email. The list contained all employees the agency hired in the past two years. A former CIA agent called the reporting of the names “a counterintelligence disaster.”

Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion (DEI)

2/4/25 NBC reports: “Federal health workers are expressing fear and alarm after a website called “DEI Watch List” published the photos, names and public information of a number of workers across health agencies, describing them at one point as “targets.”

It’s unclear when the website, which lists mostly Black employees who work in agencies primarily within the Department of Health and Human Services, first appeared.

“Offenses” for the workers listed on the website include working on diversity, equity and inclusion initiatives, donating to Democrats and using pronouns in their bios.”

2/6/25 NIH employees state that the NIH is removing applications from graduate students from underrepresented backgrounds. F31-Diversity applications were trashed instead of being diverted to the standard F31 pool. Karen James posted, “This is not the absence of DEI (which would be bad enough) it is outright racist discrimination.”

Treasury Department

Last weekend, a 25 year old engineer named Marko Elez was given direct access to Treasury Department systems responsible for nearly all payments made by the US government including federal tax returns, Social Security benefits, Supplemental Security Income benefits, and Veterans pay. When two dozen Democratic Congressional representatives tried to enter the Treasury on Monday, they were denied by security. They protested in front of the building and gave speeches. Historian Kevin M. Kruse responded, “Deeply appreciate the congressman doing this, but at some point we’re going to need our elected officials to refuse to take no for an answer. Make them arrest you if need be. Force the issue.”

Senator Chris Murphy said, "We don’t pledge allegiance to Elon Musk. We don't pledge allegiance to the creepy 22 year olds working for Elon Musk. We pledge allegiance to the United States of America."

February 5, DOGE employee Luke Farritor was delaying HHS (NIH, CDC) payments and grants per Marisa Kabas. DOGE employees were also "searching the Medicare Payment system for fraud" per WSJ.

On Thursday 2/6/25, "Judge Colleen Kollar-Kotelly approved a temporary restraining order that prevented two DOGE-affiliated employees, Tom Krause and Marko Elez, from accessing anything other than read-only records from the Bureau of Fiscal Service’s systems." But damage may have already been done according to Wired who reported that Elez had direct write access, enabling him to implement unverified changes to the Treasury's payment system. Josh Marshall confirmed in his blog, “Elez not only has full access to these systems, he has already made extensive changes to the code base for these critical payment systems.” This poses a serious cybersecurity risk, potentially exposing the Treasury’s system to vulnerabilities and hackers.

Thursday, Marko Elez unexpectedly resigned after the Wall Street Journal revealed his extremely racist and eugenics social media posts. His “work” on the Treasury system’s payment system may have already been completed.

According to Futurism, Senator Ron Wyden (D-OR) said, "People will be held accountable for the crimes they’re committing in this coup attempt.” Wyden has publicly demanded answers about DOGE's "illegal seizure of Americans' private data." He told Wired. "I’m not letting up on my investigation of what these Musk hatchet men are up to."

Department of Education

According to two sources, NBC News reported that the White House is preparing an executive order to eliminate the Education Department. As Michigan Law Professor Leah Litman posted, “The Department of Education is a department created by statute; it cannot be eliminated by Executive Order!”

A Washington Post report revealed that Elon Musk’s artificial intelligence (AI) system for DOGE was used to assess Department of Education programs for budget cuts. Disability advocates warn of reduced accommodations for disabled students, while experts question AI reliability, data security, and bias.

NBC reported today that two members of Elon Musk’s DOGE team, Akash Bobba and Ethan Shaotran who are both 22 years old, have obtained “administrator” email accounts at the Department of Education. A group of House Democrats tried to enter the Education Department headquarters on Friday morning to meet with Acting Education Secretary Denise Carter after 95 of them signed a letter expressing concern over potential plans to close the department. Security blocked their entry, leading to a chaotic scene as lawmakers attempted to gain access.

Gaza, the “Riviera of the Middle East”

On February 4th, Trump announced that the United States may take over the Gaza strip, kick out 1.8 million Palestinians from their homes, and develop a seaside resort in its place.

Senator Chris Murphy said that this idea was so ridiculous, that it was being used as a distraction from billionaire Musk’s illegal seizure of departments in the federal government. He said,

"The impact is to try to distract Americans from the real story. Donald Trump and Elon Musk are trying to seize control of the government so they can punish their enemies and reward their friends, try to squash dissent, and gobble up a bunch of money to be able to pass along another massive tax cut for their billionaire and corporate friends."

“We are not going to occupy and invade Gaza. We are not going to invade Greenland. We are not taking back the Panama Canal. But Donald Trump is really good at this campaign of distraction.

“You saw the American people start to rise up over the weekend when they heard that Elon Musk was inside Treasury stealing their data. And Donald Trump doesn’t want you or anybody else to talk about that today. He wants to change the conversation, and how does he do that? By making a ridiculous promise that the United States is going to invade, occupy, clear out and rebuild Gaza.”- Sen. Chris Murphy

Air Safety and the FAA

From Heather Cox-Richardson’s blog Letters from an American, “In what sounds like an attempt to hand over air traffic control systems to Elon Musk’s Starlink satellite system and his AI company, Trump today said—and here are his words, as Aaron Rupar transcribed them—“We’re all gonna sit down and do a great computerized system for our control towers. Brand new. Not pieced together, obsolete, like it is, land-based. Trying to hook up a land based system to a satellite system.”

Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy posted “Talked to the DOGE team. They are going to plug in to help upgrade our aviation system.”

Former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton responded, “They have no relevant experience. Most of them aren't old enough to rent a car. And you're going to let them mess with airline safety that's already deteriorated on your watch?”

Duffy told Clinton, “You need to sit this one out.”

Clinton pointed out: “US airlines had gone 16 years without fatal crashes. Then MAGA fired the FAA chief, gutted the Aviation Security Advisory Committee, and threatened air traffic controllers with layoffs. Now there have been two fatal crashes. Hope your unvetted 22-year-olds fix things fast.”

Critics of Musk's potential takeover of the nation’s air traffic control systems pointed out that Tesla vehicles have the highest fatal accident rate among all car brands in the United States according to Heather Cox-Richardson.

NOAA

DOGE engineer Nikhil Rajpal was given editor access to the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) sites this week. NOAA, responsible for monitoring oceans, atmosphere, and climate change, plays a crucial role in severe weather predictions and disaster preparedness. Project 2025 wanted to privatize NOAA information so that people would have to pay to have access to weather information. Lawmakers and experts warn that weakening NOAA could leave communities vulnerable to extreme weather events including hurricanes and tornadoes.

HHS: CDC, NIH, FDA

NIH Grants

When a researcher receives a grant from the National Institutes of Health (NIH), they typically receive direct costs (researcher salaries, lab equipment, and supplies) to conduct the experiments and indirect costs to support the facilities in which the research is completed. Indirect costs include facilities and maintenance fees (utilities, building maintenance, security and custodial services), administrative support (grant management and compliance, human resources, legal services), IT support, library services, regulatory services (IRBs, biosafety and hazardous waste disposal), and training.

Friday evening, the NIH sent out a letter entitled “Supplemental Guidance to the 2024 NIH Grants Policy Statement: Indirect Cost Rates” significantly limiting indirect costs that universities and hospitals receive from NIH grant funding to 15%. In 2017, Trump’s administration tried to reduce NIH indirect cost payments, but Congress blocked the change. Significantly cutting indirect costs will make it impossible for many universities to do research. As Angie Rasmussen posted, for every $1 invested by the NIH in research, there is a $2.50 return.

HHS Payment Delays

On Wednesday, DOGE was given full access to the HHS Payment Management System which is responsible for $1 Trillion per year in grants and supports the NIH, CDC and other public health initiatives. According to Marisa Kabas, DOGE employee Luke Farritor was actively delaying payments to recipients.

Mass Federal Layoffs

According to the Wall Street Journal, Trump is working on an executive order to fire thousands of U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) workers next week including employees from the NIH, CDC, FDA and the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services. This could cause chaos that could put our health in danger.

Censorship

Darby Saxbe reported that a National Science Foundation program officer reported that grant applications must remove certain keywords related to diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) or their grant application would be removed. Forbidden words include “women, female, black and latinx”, but the words “white” and “male” are still allowed.

Additionally, a lawsuit has been filed against the administration for removing health-related data from government websites.

NSF Grant Forbidden Words

Forbidden words per the NSF:

In another act of censorship, the Trump administration has taken unprecedented steps to control the CDC’s Morbidity and Mortality Weekly Report (MMWR) after stopping the publication for 2 weeks. Political appointees including acting CDC Director Susan Monarez removed 3 studies on the spread of H5N1 bird flu this week, instead reporting on wildfires, days after President Trump criticized Democratic Governor Gavin Newsom's handling of fires in Southern California. Interestingly, the MMWR article on wildfires “accidentally” included a chart on transmission of H5N1 from humans to pet cats and vice versa. The original CDC MMWR post on bird flu transmission between cats and people had been briefly posted and then removed on Wednesday according to the NY Times.

Chart from the article on transmission between humans and cats that accidentally was included in the MMWR wildfire article.

At the National Prayer Breakfast this week, Trump claimed credit for delivering water to California, saying he “opened it up” from the Pacific Northwest. However, Politico reports that the 2 billion gallons of water he dumped in the Central Valley last week were intended for farm irrigation, not firefighting, and were completely wasted. That water could not have physically reached Los Angeles because of the distance and by the time that Trump wasted it, the L.A. fires were already out.

Medicine’s response

Doctors For America representing 27,000 physicians and medical students filed a lawsuit on Tuesday against multiple federal agencies (CDC, FDA, HHS, OPM) over the removal of public health information and other health-related data from government websites.

Today, the Lancet posted an article entitled “American chaos: standing up for health and medicine” that summarizes many of the changes that Donald Trump put forth since his inauguration and commenting:

“Donald Trump's actions domestically and globally are not a measured reappraisal of US priorities. They are a sweeping and damaging attack on the health of the American people and those dependent on US foreign assistance. They are also an attack on the health and medical research community.”

"The past 3 weeks have generated much anger, fear, and sorrow—but it is no time for panic. The medical and scientific communities must come together and stand up for this vision. In that spirit, The Lancet will be a focal point of accountability over the next 4 years, monitoring and reviewing the actions of the US Government and the consequences of its decisions for health."

"This moment is a test. How should our community react? The immediate result has been confusion, disruption, and disorientation, but the response cannot be dictated by fear or resignation. There is a need for focus, strategy, and—indeed—hope."

I’ll send out the COVID newsletter tomorrow or Monday.

Take care,

Ruth Ann Crystal MD