Labor & Employment Law Daily Wrap Up, HOUSE NEWS—Rep. Connolly seeks information on technological malfeasance, illegal activity by DOGE at DOL, NLRB, (Apr 17, 2025)

By Patricia K. Ruiz, J.D.

Connolly highlighted Musk’s potential conflicts of interest resulting from DOL, NLRB enforcement actions against his companies.

U.S. Representative Gerald E. Connolly (D-VA), ranking member of the Committee on Oversight and Government Reform, demanded in a letter to Luiz A. Santos, Acting Inspector General (IG) at the Department of Labor (DOL) and Ruth Blevins, IG at the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) that the IGs investigate any technological malfeasance and illegal activity undertaken by Elon Musk and the Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) within their organizations. Citing NPR and whistleblower disclosures obtained by Committee Democrats, Connolly wrote that “individuals associated with DOGE have attempted to exfiltrate and alter data while using high-level systems access to remove sensitive information—quite possibly including corporate secrets and details of union activities.”

Conflicts of interest. Connolly in his letter emphasized that DOL and NLRB enforcement actions against Musk’s companies create inherent conflicts of interest for him to direct work at either agency and asked the IGs to report to Congress the nature of the work the DOGE team has performed at the DOL and NLRB. Musk’s business ventures, SpaceX, Tesla, and X have made repeated worker safety and labor violations, and federal enforcement bodies struggle to keep up, Connolly wrote.

For example, a Reuters investigation into SpaceX found more than 600 unreported cases of workplace injuries including crushed limbs, amputations, electrocutions, head and eye wounds, and one death. The NLRB took action against Tesla for its attempts to discourage unionizing efforts and against social media company X for terminating an employee following a tweet challenging the company’s return-to-office mandate.

The letter stresses that these are not hypothetical concerns, as recent public reporting indicates DOGE engineers accessed sensitive information that may relate to these actions against Musk’s companies and his competitors and that the engineers sent the information to external sources. The engineers reportedly used administrative access to information technology systems to eliminate evidence of their actions. The letter states, “Willfully and unlawfully removing or destroying federal records is a criminal offense, as is receiving stolen government property.”

Information requested. Connolly requested that the IGs respond to a number of questions regarding the specific networks at the NLRB and DOL that DOGE gained access to; the stated justification for such access; information regarding current and prior NLRB or DOL enforcement actions DOGE accessed; and under what authority they accessed the data. He also requested information on the datasets, databases, or systems of records owned by the NLRB or DOL that were altered in any way by individuals associated with DOGE; system controls in place to prevent unauthorized deletion of data by any individual; the identities of individuals associated with DOGE who have edited, deleted, or exfiltrated data from NLRB or DOL systems; and the identities of individuals associated with DOGE who have taken any actions that could conceal their access to NLRB or DOL systems or their alteration, manipulation, or exfiltration of data on those systems.

Connolly requested that the IGs respond to the questions by April 29, 2025.

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