Musk deploys AI to monitor federal workers for "Trump hostility" through DOGE

On 2025-03-01, Reuters reported that Elon Musk’s Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) deployed AI at the Environmental Protection Agency to flag employee communications containing “anti-Trump or anti-Musk language.” (Reuters exclusive investigation)

On 2025-03-01, an EPA manager warned staff to “Be careful what you say, what you type and what you do” after learning about the AI surveillance program. (Reuters manager warning)

On 2025-03-01, Reuters reported DOGE was using Grok—the AI chatbot developed by xAI—in a customized government version to analyze internal EPA communications without formal departmental approval. (Reuters Grok usage; Reuters approval issues)

On 2025-03-01, Albert Fox Cahn, Executive Director of the Surveillance Technology Oversight Project, called DOGE’s data practices “about as serious a privacy threat as you get.” (Reuters privacy concerns)

On 2025-03-01, Kathleen Clark, government ethics expert at Washington University in St. Louis, said the monitoring “sounds like an abuse of government power to suppress or deter speech that the president of the United States doesn’t like.” (Reuters Clark quote)

On 2025-03-01, the EPA told Reuters it was “looking at AI to better optimize agency functions” and did not confirm or deny whether it was using AI to surveil employees’ communications. (Reuters EPA statement)