Tag: notice

Federal prosecutor puts potential DOGE sabotage on notice with threat of ‘any and all legal action’

Newly-appointed interim U.S. Attorney for the District of Columbia Ed Martin published a letter vowing to hold to account those who try to sabotage efforts of the Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) to clean the federal government of overspending and corruption.

“I recognize that some of the staff at DOGE have been targeted publicly,” Martin wrote to Elon Musk in a letter, which Martin posted to his X account Monday. “At this time, I ask that you utilize me and my staff to assist in protecting the DOGE work and the DOGE workers. Any threats, confrontations or other actions in any way that impact their work may break numerous laws.”

“Let me assure you of this: We will pursue any and all legal action against anyone who impedes your work or threatens your people,” he continued. “We will not act like the previous administration who looked the other way as the Antifa and BLM rioters as well as thugs with guns trashed our capital city. We will protect DOGE and other workers no matter what.”

Martin previously worked as a defense attorney, including representing three men charged in the Jan. 6 protests, when President Donald Trump supporters breached the U.S. Capitol in 2021.

Trump granted clemency to more than 1,500 Jan. 6, 2021 criminal defendants upon taking office in January.

ELON MUSK DUNKS ON SEN CHUCK SCHUMER, DECLARING ‘HYSTERICAL REACTIONS’ DEMONSTRATE DOGE’S IMPORTANCE

Newly-appointed interim U.S. Attorney for the District of Columbia Ed Martin, inset, published a letter vowing to hold to account those who try to sabotage efforts of the Department of Government Efficiency, led by Elon Musk. (Chesnot/Getty Images )

Trump appointed Martin the interim United States attorney for Washington, D.C., shortly following his Jan. 20 inauguration.

Martin’s letter comes as Musk takes a hatchet to government agencies such as the United States Agency for International Development (USAID) to rid the departments of what the administration has described as corruption and overspending.

RUBIO SAYS ‘NO CHOICE’ BUT TO BRING USAID ‘UNDER CONTROL’ AFTER AGENCY TAKEOVER: ‘RANK INSUBORDINATION’

News reports spread this week that Musk’s DOGE team includes a group of college-age engineers to help dismantle government overspending and reported corruption, which has sparked some on social media to attack the team, including threatening to dox them, according to a review of some reactions online.

News reports spread this week that the DOGE team, led by Elon Musk, includes a group of college-age engineers to help dismantle government overspending and reported corruption. ( Samuel Corum/Getty Images)

Martin noted in his Monday public letter that he worked with the DOGE team “this weekend,” while warning that “we must keep all our American government employees safe and we must protect the American people’s property.”

“One last warning to you,” Martin wrote in the conclusion of his letter to Musk. “Late last week, we indicted an economist who worked for the Fed for economic espionage for the Communist Chinese. Please be very aware that there are those who are acting against our American people in every way. Refer to us any questionable conduct or details that you find or notice.”

USAID CLOSES HQ TO STAFFERS MONDAY AS MUSK SAYS TRUMP SUPPORTS SHUTTING AGENCY DOWN

USAID’s fate is hanging in the balance as Musk went on a warpath against the independent government agency as a “viper’s nest of radical-left marxists who hate America.” On Monday morning, hundreds of USAID employees reported they were locked out of the agency’s computer system and that its headquarters in Washington, D.C., was closed.

Elon Musk, left, announced in an audio-only message on X overnight on Sunday that “we’re in the process” of “shutting down USAID” and that President Donald Trump reportedly agreed to shutter the agency. (Brandon Bell/Getty Images)

MUSK RIPS ‘FRAUDULENT’ TREASURY HANDOUTS AS REPORTS MOUNT DOGE HAS ACCESS TO FEDERAL PAYMENT SYSTEM

Musk announced in an audio-only message on X overnight on Sunday that “we’re in the process” of “shutting down USAID” and that Trump reportedly agreed to shutter the agency.

Secretary of State Marco Rubio announced on Monday that he is now serving as acting director of the agency and outlined that its policies need to shift to fall in line with Trump’s “America First” mission.

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“USAID is not functioning. It has to be aligned with U.S. policy,” he told reporters while in El Salvador. “It needs to be aligned with the national interest of the U.S. They’re not a global charity. These are taxpayer dollars. People are asking simple questions. What are they doing with the money? We are spending taxpayers’ money. We owe the taxpayers assurances that it furthers our national interest.”

February 4, 2025
Trump puts higher education on notice for ‘dangerous, demeaning, and immoral’ DEI teachings

President Donald Trump’s latest executive order seeks to water down diversity, equity and inclusion (DEI) practices in federally funded higher-education institutions in an effort to restore “merit-based opportunity,” according to the White House.

During his first two days in office, Trump issued a slew of executive orders, including ordering that all federal agencies close their DEI offices by Wednesday and put employees in those units on paid leave. To further his effort to deter DEI, the president is launching a federal review of such teachings and practices in educational institutions receiving federal funding.

“Institutions of higher education have adopted and actively use dangerous, demeaning, and immoral race and sex-based preferences under the guise of so-called ‘diversity, equity, and inclusion,’” reads the White House order, published on Tuesday.

The order requires that the attorney general and secretary of education identify potential civil compliance investigations among institutions of higher education with endowments over $1 billion dollars and, accordingly, develop action plans to “deter DEI programs or principles that constitute illegal discrimination or preferences.”

CONSERVATIVE GROUP REVEALS HOW TRUMP CAN CLEAN HOUSE AT DEPARTMENT OF EDUCATION, LISTS TO BUREAUCRATS TO FIRE

President Donald Trump was sworn in as the 47th president on Monday. (Evan Vucci)

Within 120 days, the AG and the secretary of education will issue guidance to state and local educational institutions that receive federal funds or grants or that participate in the student loan program. The focus will be on ensuring compliance with the Supreme Court’s decision in Students for Fair Admissions, Inc. v. President and Fellows of Harvard College, a landmark case that held that race-based admissions practices violate the Fourteenth Amendment.

“Illegal DEI and DEIA policies not only violate the text and spirit of our longstanding Federal civil-rights laws, they also undermine our national unity, as they deny, discredit, and undermine the traditional American values of hard work, excellence, and individual achievement in favor of an unlawful, corrosive, and pernicious identity-based spoils system,” the memo reads.

The executive order noted that it will not prevent educational institutions or agencies from engaging in “First Amendment-protected” speech.

WHITE HOUSE OPM ORDERS ALL DEI OFFICES TO BEGIN CLOSING BY END OF DAY WEDNESDAY

Rep. Tim Walberg, R-Mich., who chairs the House Education and the Workforce Committee, applauded Trump for pushing back against the controversial practice.

Linda McMahon, former administrator of the U.S. Small Business Administration and education secretary nominee for President Donald Trump, arrives for a meeting with Sen. Bernie Moreno, a Republican from Ohio, not pictured, on Capitol Hill on Jan. 8, 2025. (Valerie Plesch/Bloomberg)

“For too long, social justice warriors crusaded to mandate DEI in every corner of America. Instead of merit, skills and ability, DEI devotees pushed policies that are antithetical to American exceptionalism,” Walberg said. “From the classroom to the boardroom, Americans have felt the negative effects. DEI has bloated education budgets while telling students what to think instead of how to think.”

Jonathan Turley, a Fox News contributor and the Shapiro Professor of Public Interest Law at George Washington University, suggested in an analysis of the executive order that it “will send a shock wave through higher education and the resulting agency actions are likely to trigger a tsunami of lawsuits.”

President Donald Trump takes part in a signing ceremony after his inauguration on Jan. 20, 2025, in the President’s Room at the U.S. Capitol. (Melina Mara)

Meanwhile, one education expert suggested that universities could begin to pre-comply with new DEI measures.

“It seems very plausible that higher-education institutions will pre-comply, even before the Department of Education or the National Science Foundation writes it into specific projects,” Eboo Patel, founder and president of Interfaith America, told the Chronicle of Higher Education. “Universities will adopt the spirit of the executive order.”

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Nearly 10 states, including one with a Democrat governor, have already either banned or prohibited the use of DEI initiatives in public colleges and universities.

Aubrie Spady is a Writer for Fox News Digital.

January 23, 2025