The Trump administration’s crackdown on the controversial United States Agency for International Development (USAID) continues with some of its employees sent on leave and some fired. The Elon Musk-led Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) has been in the news for its action against the wastage of government funds, the DOGE team gaining access to sensitive data of the Treasury Department and USAID. As DOGE goes berserk to slash wasteful expenditures and restructure federal agencies, the DOGE team has intrigued the people of the United States.

The centre of the DOGE team reportedly includes six techies between the ages of 19 and 24. Elon Musk’s top picks for US President Donald Trump’s order to modernise federal technology and software to “maximise efficiency and productivity”, however, lack experience in government affairs. Of the six tech prodigies in the DOGE team, one is a college student and the other is a volunteer, however, all of them are connected to Elon Musk.

The six tech prodigies at the DOGE team who have become the topic of discussion on social media are Akash Bobba, Edward Coristine, Luke Farritor, Gautier Cole Killian, Gavin Kliger, and Ethan Shaotran. Of these, some have working emails from the General Services Administration (GSA) and OPM even though they do not have any prior government experience.

Akash Bobba is reported to be from the University of California, Berkeley, where he was in the renowned Management, Entrepreneurship, and Technology program. As per Bobba’s now-deleted LinkedIn profile, the 21-year-old techie was an investment engineering intern at the Bridgewater Associates hedge fund. Akash Bobba also interned at tech behemoths Meta and Palantir.

Telling people about the Indian-origin techie’s skills and efficiency, Charis Zhang, the CEO of Grata AI who also attended UC Berkeley said, “Let me tell you something about Akash. During a project at Berkeley, I accidentally deleted our entire codebase 2 days before the deadline. I panicked. Akash just stared at the screen, shrugged, and rewrote everything from scratch in one night—better than before. We submitted early and got first in the class. Many such stories. I trust him with everything I own.”

Notably, Akash Bobba has been listed in the internal official documents as an “expert” at the Office of Personnel Management (OPM). Bobba directly reports to Amanda Scales, the new chief of staff.

Another DOGE team member Edward Coristine recently graduated from high school and enrolled in Northeastern University. For three months last year, Corisitine was also at Elon Musk’s brain-computer interface company Neuralink. Like Akash Bobba, Coristine is also posted as an “expert” at OPM.

Meanwhile, 25-year-old Gavin Kliger, who like Akash Bobba attended UC Berkely and also worked at AI company Databricks. In 2019, Kliger worked for a while as an engineer at Twitter. As per Kliger’s LinkedIn profile, he holds the position of Special Advisor to the Director at the OPM. In a Substack entry, Kliger delved into why ditched his “seven-figure salary” to “save America”.

Interestingly, an NYT report says that it was Gavin Kliger who sent the staff-wide emails to USAID workers to work from home as the DOGE and Trump administration were scrutinising the agency.

Another DOGE team member Luke Farritor previously worked as an intern at Musk-owned SpaceX. The 23-year-old is currently a Theil Fellow after dropping out of the University of Nebraska-Lincoln. In his school days, Farritor was a member of the team that won an award for deciphering portions of an ancient Greek scroll.

Meanwhile, Ethan Shaotran’s interaction with Business Insider last year reveals that he was a senior at Harvard studying computer science, and also the founder of an OpenAI-backed startup, Energize AI.

Gautier Cole Killian who has a DOGE associate email is currently listed as a “volunteer” in the official internal documents. A 24-year-old Killian graduated from high school in 2019 and attended McGill University. As per his now-deleted website, Killian worked as an engineer at Jump Trading.

While Elon Musk was initially displeased over the doxing of DOGE core team members, however, the billionaire slightly softened his stance and “admitted” that “Media reports saying that @DOGE has some of world’s best software engineers are in fact true.”

US netizens express concerns over handing over too much power and sensitive information to ‘inexperienced’ tech nerds

Notably, Bobba, Coristine, Farritor, and Shaotran have General Services Administration (GSA) clearance allowing them access to all IT systems and data. As per a WIRED report, some officials in federal agencies have raised concerns that the DOGE team members with GSA clearance can bypass conventional security clearance protocols and access highly sensitive government data.

Just days back, the DOGE team members, whom a section of US netizens is calling “DOGE Kids” visited the USAID headquarters to seek information from its secure compartmented information facility (SCIF) on the second floor of the Ronald Reagan Building in Washington D.C.

Even though the information sought was not classified, the USAID officials were reluctant to let the DOGE ‘kids’ access the secure room. Reportedly, one of the DOGE team members dialled to Elon Musk informing him about the USAID officials declining them access to the SCIF. Musk then warned the USAID officials of involving the US Marshal’s Service. Consequently, the DOGE team was allowed to access the secure room.

US Attorney says anyone threatening the DOGE team members will be prosecuted under law

In a letter to Elon Musk, Ed Martin, the US Attorney, District of Columbia, alleged that the DOGE team including Luke Farritor, Edward Coristine, Jeremy Lewin and Gavin Kliger were threatened by the USAID officials.

As the DOGE team members, however young and ‘inexperienced’ are exercising the rights they have been given by the Trump administration, they are receiving death threats and hate on social media, particularly on the social media platform Bluesky. Not to forget, Bluesky is a competitor of Musk-owned X, and an echo chamber of pro-Democrats, liberals and wokes.

Raising concern over young tech nerds being granted access to sensitive information from various federal agencies, an X user Emily shared a screenshot of Coristine’s LinkedIn profile and wrote, “Public servants forced to defend their work to a recent high school graduate who up until a few weeks ago went by the online name “Big Balls”.

Meanwhile, a Bluesky user Jacqueline Sweet wrote, “Contrary to some info I’ve seen, 19-yr-old Doge staffer “BigBalls” Edward Coristine did not delete his X account, it’s just renamed and is private. Wired reported that govt tech workers had to defend their work to the Neuralink intern in an Office Space-esque scene.”

Contrary to some info I've seen, 19-yr-old Doge staffer "BigBalls" Edward Coristine did not delete his X account, it's just renamed and is private.

Wired reported that govt tech workers had to defend their work to the Neuralink intern in an Office Space-esque scene.

/ more for Canadians

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— Jacqueline Sweet (@jsweetli.bsky.social) 2 February 2025 at 23:52

Mocking Edward Coristine, one X user wrote, “Let it be known that 19-year-old Edward Coristine, previously @edwardbigballer on X (since deleted) is confirmed as to be one of @DOGE’s unqualified goons. Imagine being a career fed staffer and being expected to let this kid “review your code” with a straight face. Laughable.”

DOGE team gets hi-tech sleeping pods to use as they stay and work in office

To ensure that the officials work round the clock, earlier, beds and sofas were installed in the OPM office. Now Eightsleep’s CEO Matteo Franceschetti announced on Sunday that his company would provide sleeping pods for DOGE employees. A day later, Franceschetti informed that several sleeping pods had been delivered to the DOGE office. “MISSION COMPLETED. The @eightsleep Pods have been delivered to  @DOGE. I hope this will supercharge @elonmusk and the incredible team to shape the future of America. Let’s go,” Franceschetti posted. In response, Elon Musk thanked Franceschetti for his sweet gesture.

Is inducting talented but young folks into DOGE a good or a bad idea?

While Elon Musk calls DOGE the wood chipper of bureaucracy, the concerns over young techies getting access to sensitive data of lakhs of Americans is not unnecessary. The very combo of too much power and too little experience is worrisome. There are valid concerns about whether these young techies would be able to understand and navigate the complexities of the federal bureaucracy and with a non-governmental agency comprising people as young as 19 having access to sensitive information is immune to misuse.  

Even though the appointment these highly talented youngsters is unconventional, but then Trump administration’s approach since its very inauguration of 20th January 2025 has been quite unconventional. While young techies definitely lack government experience, they would bring new perspectives and innovative solutions to longstanding inefficiencies in governmental operations. In fact, their lack of government operations or bureaucratic norms can allow them to come up with out-of-the-box thinking. Also, since these young tech nerds would be less encumbered by the usual slow pace of government processes, it would accelerate the implementation of new technologies and systems.

It must not be forgotten that DOGE’s aim is not confined to curbing wasteful expenditure but also to modernise federal technology and maximise efficiency and productivity. As the executive order signed by President Trump reads, “The USDS Administrator shall commence a Software Modernization Initiative to improve the quality and efficiency of government-wide software, network infrastructure, and information technology (IT) systems. Among other things, the USDS Administrator shall work with Agency Heads to promote inter-operability between agency networks and systems, ensure data integrity, and facilitate responsible data collection and synchronization.”

Despite the government experience, Akash Bobba, Farritor and others come with backgrounds from prestigious universities and tech giants. They are tech-savvy and well-versed in the latest digital tools and related methodologies, which is crucial for modernising government agencies.

As tracking the USAID’s decades of spending and activities needs some extraordinary prowess, the young computer nerds, allegedly the best software engineers in the world, might just be the beginning of a long ‘cleaning’ process for the bureaucratic swamp that has been leaking tax dollars at an alarming rate. Stopping wasteful federal expenditure has been one of the main promises of the Trump administration, a major issue the people voted them for.

DOGE’s accomplishments so far

The disruption of USAID and the ban on its funding to various projects in state-sponsor of terrorism Pakistan, Bangladesh and other countries besides involvement in anti-India activities are among the major achievements of DOGE. In addition, Elon Musk recently informed that the DOGE team found that payment approval officers at the Treasury Department were instructed to approve payments, even to known fraudulent or terrorist groups.

Recently, David Lebryk, a top Treasury Department official resigned over the DOGE team demanding access to the payment system that Treasury officials use to disburse funds. Within just days into the operation, DOGE officials making such huge revelations about payment approval officers approving funds to even fraudulent and terrorist outfits is quite remarkable.

Be it imposing a sweeping freeze on foreign assistance by USAID to scrapping around 104 DEI contracts, DOGE’s actions are saving the American taxpayers’ money. It was reported that DOGE saved about $1 billion taxpayers’ money by detecting and cutting wasteful expenditures. The agency is also making efforts to cut regulatory burdens and is reviewing and working towards restructuring of federal agencies to make them leaner and more efficient.

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