Trump ally, whose team has reportedly gained access to sensitive data, accused of ‘desecrating our constitution’. Hundreds of protesters and a contingent of Democratic lawmakers rallied outside the Department of the Treasury in Washington on Tuesday, denouncing what they called Elon Musk’s “hostile takeover” of federal financial systems, as demonstrations spilled on to, and took over, the street outside the building.

The protests targeted reports of the “department of government efficiency” (Doge) team’s reported access to sensitive government financial data, including information related to social security payments, Medicare reimbursements, and tax refunds – systems that process trillions of dollars in annual transactions. “He has access to all our information, our social security numbers, the federal payment system,” Representative Maxwell Frost told the crowd. “What’s going to stop him from stealing taxpayer money?”.

About a dozen members of Congress, including Maxine Waters, Al Green, Ayanna Pressley, and senators Jeff Merkley and Richard Blumenthal, joined the condemnations. Jasmine Crockett’s voice boomed across the crowd: “We are not going to sit around while you go and desecrate our constitution. We are going to be in your face and on your asses!”. Minutes earlier, a handful of lawmakers, including Crockett, Pressley, Frost and Jamie Raskin, had attempted to get inside the treasury department before being rebuffed.

Near the tail-end of the demonstration, news broke that the treasury said Musk’s team had been granted “read-only” access to “coded data” of the government’s payments system, according to Bloomberg. In a letter to Senator Ron Wyden, Jonathan Blum, the treasury’s principal deputy assistant secretary for legislative affairs, wrote that the system remains “robust and effective” and that no valid payment requests from government agencies had been rejected.

But that did little to quell protesters’ concerns about Musk’s involvement with systems in the first place, including many who were former federal contractors, such as Alexa Fraser, who worked in public health research. “What protections did he turn off to get in there? Who has he sold it to?” she told the Guardian. “We have no reason to think his security situation is better now.”. Dave Stoakley, who drove more than two hours from central Virginia to protest, saw the situation as part of a larger pattern. “I think it’s an intentional dismantling of the government,” he said. “They’re throwing out the good with the bad.”.