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Warren, Markey join Senate Dems. to demand answers about Musk’s Education Dept. access
The world's richest man could have access to sensitive information about tens of millions of student loan borrowers.
Sens. Elizabeth Warren and Ed Markey joined with 14 of their Democratic colleagues Thursday to demand answers after Elon Musk and his team reportedly gained access to federal student loan data within the Department of Education.
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The move comes as President Donald Trump prepares to try to destroy the Education Department, despite Constitutional limits on his power to do so. Musk vowed in a post on X that the Trump administration would do just that.
Musk, the world’s richest man, and his “Department of Government Efficiency” (DOGE) team have been rampaging through Washington, determined to gut key agencies in a purported effort to cut waste and locate instances of fraud. Many of his actions could be illegal, experts are warning.
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Every year, 13 million students receive federal financial aid, and there are more than 40 million federal student loan borrowers in the U.S., according to a letter sent by the senators to Denise Carter, the Education Department’s acting secretary. The federal student loan database contains massive amounts of highly sensitive information about these borrowers, including their Social Security numbers, their marital status, and income information.
The senators cite reports about how Musk’s team includes of a small group of 19- to 24-year-old engineers linked to some of Musk’s companies with unclear titles could be getting around regular security guardrails.
“This deeply troubling report raises questions about potential exposures of Americans’ private data, the abuse of this data by the Trump Administration, and whether officials who have access to the data may have violated the law or the federal government’s procedures for handling sensitive information,” the lawmakers wrote.
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The DOGE team’s actions could also be violating the Privacy Act of 1974, which protects individuals’ personal information from unwarranted federal government access.
The senators said that talk of abolishing the Education Department are stoking fear among the millions of students, families, and teachers who rely on the department for financial aid, loans, grants, and more.
“The millions of families who rely on ED to help them achieve the American Dream deserve answers about reports that an unelected billionaire and his team now have access to some of their most sensitive personal information,” the senators wrote.
They laid out a series of questions about Musk’s access and what safeguards are in place to protect sensitive federal loan data for Carter to answer by Feb. 13.
In addition to Warren and Markey, the letter was signed by Sens. Chuck Schumer, Tina Smith, Chris Van Hollen, Richard Blumenthal, Raphael Warnock, Tammy Duckworth, Ron Wyden, Mazie Hirono, Alex Padilla, Cory Booker, Jeffrey Merkley, Richard Durbin, Ben Ray Lujan, and Jack Reed.
Earlier this week, Markey filed an amendment to the Transparency in Charges for Key Events Ticketing (TICKET) Act targeted at DOGE that would have made it a violation of the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) Act for an individual to gain unauthorized access to the central payment systems at the Treasury Department. The Senate Committee on Commerce, Science, and Transportation voted the amendment down along party lines Wednesday.
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