Kinzinger to House Dems: ‘Get out there and do something’ about Musk

https://thehill.com/homenews/house/5123076-adam-kinzinger-democrats-elon-musk/

41 comments

  1. “All these agencies where employees are being locked out of, how about you send members of Congress with those employees to walk them into work, or just send members [of] Congress to go into the building and investigate what these people are doing, dare them to stop you because they can’t,” Kinzinger [said in a video posted](https://x.com/AdamKinzinger/status/1886430358243054073) on the social platform X.

    “Okay, that’s a free idea,” he added. “Why is it that the former Republicans are the ones that are coming up with all the ideas? Get out there and do something, you’re in the minority. Your message is your weapon. Use your message. Quit staying at home.”

    Late last week, senior USAID officials were put [on administrative leave](https://thehill.com/homenews/administration/5122285-usaid-leaders-escorted-out-of-building-after-blocking-doge-access-to-secure-systems/) after they refused to hand over classified material to Musk’s Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE).

    “Dear Democratic Leaders: here’s a free idea, send members of congress into the buildings where Elons people are and see what they’re doing,” Kinzinger also captioned his Monday X post.

  2. All Democrats can do is shine a light on things. Maybe that makes a difference, maybe it doesn’t. I’d say it’s still something they need to be doing more of.

  3. Suddenly, it seems like Musk is the real president while Trump is just a figurehead, MAGA party leader and head of state. What the fuck?

  4. This is one for the history books (in other countries) how no one that could did a damn thing

  5. Why is a former Republican being louder about this than actual democratic representatives? 

    Why are they still on vacation? 

    Musk is going to capture all of our data, then use it to blackmail and threaten all of his political opponents. Imagine going to a protest and the next day you wake up and your life savings have been stolen. 

    Dems need to show up, now, and go where Musk is and demand answers. They need to be filing off a massive slew of lawsuits. 

    Democrats gain nothing by waiting around for trump/musk to do permanent, irreversible damage just to prove a point.

  6. Gerry Connolly took AOCs committee seat. Make him talk to the cameras about this.

  8. Can we report Elon to ICE since he’s an immigrant involved in criminal activity ?

  9. >*“Dear Democratic Leaders: here’s a free idea, send members of congress into the buildings where Elons people are and see what they’re doing,” –* Kinzinger

    That is at BARE MINIMUM what Democrats ought to be doing and I would add if any civic-minded Dems actually do go, they should take either the Sargeant-At-Arms or Capitol Police or some security detail for protection because you just know the criminal goons carrying out the co-dictator’s Musk and Trump’s crimes WILL either try to block the Dems from entering those buildings and/or forcibly remove them – because that’s just what the fucking Republican fascists do.

    >*The DEI caused the plane crash narrative is a distraction. The tariffs are a distraction. Whatever insane nonsense Trump spews that the media will chase like cats chasing a laser light is a distraction. The ONLY story that counts right now is the wholesale hijacking of control of the US government*. [https://bsky.app/profile/karaswisher.bsky.social/post/3lhavfkhu5k2x](https://bsky.app/profile/karaswisher.bsky.social/post/3lhavfkhu5k2x)

  10. You guys… I don’t think anyone is coming to save us.

    We need to be seriously talking about a general strike. Yes, I have a lot to lose and I need my health insurance — but I also don’t want to live in a dictatorship run by a Ketamine addled edgelord.

  11. “I felt a great disturbance in the Force, as if millions of voices suddenly cried out in terror and were suddenly silenced.”

  12. I dare one redditor to say some factually true power of the current Dems but that they aren’t using.

    Go:

  13. Musk should be in front of congressional tribunal right now being grilled about the shenanigans going on with DOGE.

    Congress are you ok with your power being given to a Nazi edgelord? You aren’t even going to put up a fight?

  14. Stop this coup now! Lead us to the streets if you have too. They are already trying to make it illegal in places to vote against Trump. Have the courage for fucks sake.

  15. The reason democrats aren’t doing anything is because they’re attempting a repeat of the election of 1929 – 1933. On Black Monday 1929, the U.S. stock market dropped 12% and started the Great Depression. The Herbert Hoover administration was a pro-oligarch, pro-free market political party. In response to the depression, Hoover initiated widespread implementation of tariffs, which over the course of the next four years destroyed what few industries remained in the U.S. and greatly exacerbated the effects of the Great Depression. The consequences of allowing as much suffering as human possible to occur under Hoover (giving they voters what they asked for), we got FDR. The damage to the Republican party from the Hoover admin was so catastrophic, it cost them power for 12 years.

    We’re seeing a repeat of that. Trump’s opening of California’s reservoirs unnecessarily and without consulting local governance has removed the water needed for the Central Valley’s summer growing season, so expect a famine like the Dust Bowl. The broad use of tariffs against our closest trading partners is going to shutter many industries and make importing food extremely difficult. Most of our unaffected trading partners are now renegotiating trade deals since the U.S. can no longer be counted upon to adhere to their treaty obligations and the rest of the world can no longer depend on 50,000 willfully uneducated and ignorant voters in Pennsylvania every four years for their multi-trillion dollar multi-lateral trade agreements. The long term impacts to the U.S. economy from this are impossible to overstate. We’ve lost favorable trading deals and international prestige that took literally generations to achieve.

    So, that’s the play by the Dems. The country is too divided and captured by corporate oligarchs to be saved in this historic moment. The play is to give the voters exactly what they voted for and only fight back in ineffectual and symbolic ways. Let the country suffer under the yoke of corporate fascism for four years, giving everything the fascists ever wanted to them which will totally destroy the country and erode their power base for at least the next several election cycles.

  16. Get rid of any stock associated with Elon Musk. Delete your “X” account. Don’t buy a Tesla! NOW

  17. Don’t worry, Schumer will deliver a 2 minute speech about this on the Senate floor, barely looking up from his podium delivered with the passion of a cold bologna sandwich the first week of March

  18. The terse [Executive Order establishing DOGE](https://www.whitehouse.gov/presidential-actions/2025/01/establishing-and-implementing-the-presidents-department-of-government-efficiency/) sets forth as its mandate to modernize federal information technology. But the largest donor to Trump’s 2024 campaign, [Elon Musk is unilaterally expanding that mandate to include control over financial flows throughout the federal government](https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2025-02-02/musk-says-doge-is-rapidly-shutting-down-treasury-payments?utm_campaign=instagram-bio-link&utm_content=business&utm_medium=social&utm_source=instagram&leadSource=reddit_wall). Top security officials at USAID that understood the lawlessness of Musk’s actions were placed on leave Saturday after refusing to allow DOGE staffers access to systems at the foreign assistance agency, saying the DOGE staffers lacked the required security clearances.

    Musk is targeting systems that process tens of billions of dollars a day in payments for US government agencies and the officials that oversee them. Musk’s statements on Sunday, February 2, 2025, follow last week’s departure of David Lebryk, the Treasury Department’s most senior career official, after Lebryk clashed with Musk.

    [Senator Ron Wyden](https://www.finance.senate.gov/chairmans-news/wyden-demands-answers-following-report-of-musk-personnel-seeking-access-to-highly-sensitive-us-treasury-payments-system), the top Democrat on the Senate Finance Committee, said Friday that he’s been told that Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent has granted DOGE full access to Treasury’s payment systems.

    >“Social Security and Medicare benefits, grants, payments to government contractors, including those that compete directly with Musk’s own companies,” Wyden said on BlueSky, a social media rival to Musk’s X. “All of it.”

    Treasury officials have long maintained that its role is to serve as the federal government’s clerk maintaining the government checkbook, but per the Constitution (Article I, Section 8), the spending power is vested in Congress, which upon appropriation directs individual agencies to disburse the subject funds.

    Elon Musk’s unlawful actions are interfering with funds already appropriated by Congress and which are being administered in accordance with law by authorized agencies. Unelected Elon Musk’s actions constitute a direct interference with the official acts of Congress which earlier authorized specific spending and directed government agencies to carry out that legislative directive.

    Musk’s actions warrant criminal prosecution.

  19. The corrupt oligarchs pulling the strings are the same Silicon Valley “geniuses” that drove Silicon Valley Bank (SVB) into insolvency. You the hard-working taxpayer paid for the bailout, just like you paid to remedy the 2008 financial crisis.

    The fingerprints of [Marc Andreessen and Peter Thiel](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5RpPTRcz1no) are all over this heist.

  20. Why don’t the republicans do something ? It feels weird that it always falls on the dems to fix what the repubs break.

    Let them break everything and suffer the consequences

  21. Hey, Adam – why don’t you show some leadership yourself, declare that you’re permanently leaving the GOP and that you’re a proud Democrat, willing to put Country ahead of party and stand up for the Constitution! Look in the mirror and understand your inaction and soft enabling is part of the problem!

  22. If Musk wants to choose what can and can’t happen, then why not slow it or prevent it all from happening until he gets out? Are sit-in’s still a thing? Large protests? Flash mobs? Coordinated mass visits using normal processes to particular facilities and websites/infrastructure where they are doing the latest damage to slow them down? Find where they are sleeping and eating, driving, playing, and follow them use the same services and places they do to make their routines a hassle. Stare them down. Swear them down. Stand in line in front in front of them and take extra long to finish. Waste their time. Make every single public and private moment a living hell.

  23. He’s mad that his own party is destroying democracy and wants to blame Democrat’s lack of response? Did he forget that Democrats don’t actually have any power to do anything anymore?

  24. Adam, tell your Republicans in Congress to do something. They could stop all of this TODAY. You only need a handful. Talk to them. Blame them for doing nothing. Blame them for cheering it on. Blame them because they are the ones who ushered this in, and they are the only ones who could stop it RIGHT NOW.

  25. Suddenly it’s the Democrats’ problem, when there’s a majority of Republicans in both houses quite capable of doing their sworn job? With the toady house speaker, Democrats can’t even get a vote on the floor on most things. They get their alloted 7 minutes to question the incomptent nominees, and that’s it.

    His only valid point is they need to find a single message to focus on and say it loud. However, it seems the media is not listening.

  26. I think it’s important to point out that the GOP is doing nothing about this. I know the typical response is, “this is what they want!” That doesn’t remove the responsibility they have to uphold the condition and rule of law. Get mad at them for doing bad things. That’s where Democrats can improve. Shout from the rooftops about all the shit Trump, Elon, and the GOP are doing. Call the tariffs the “Trump tax” or the “Republican plan to increase inflation.” Call the government takeover the “Republican coup.” And so on… Get the message out and get people talking about it.

  27. So much for the patriots with guns rising up against a tyrannical government.

  29. Sorry Kinzinger, but your awesome convention speech doesn’t give you the right to tell the minority power who actually tried to prevent this from happening that they need to do something. YOU REPOS DO SOMETHING AND WAKE THE FUCK UP.

  30. Me to Republicans…. get out there and do something.

  31. How about you go talk to your old Republican buddies in congress instead, dickhead? You know, the ones with the actual power right now? Democrats can’t do a damn thing alone right now, Musk and brainwashed voters made sure of that.

  32. I am disgusted by the lack of immediate action. All I hear is “it’s not legal”. Guess what? Trump doesn’t care about legal. He’s getting away with everything and the dems are sitting on their hands hiding behind lawsuits.

  33. Legitimate question. Trump controls Congress and the Judiciary, and Musk controls Trump. Is there anything they (or us?) can do that would legitimately do anything at this point? Y’know, besides violence.

  34. Um… what about House REPUBLICANS? Huh? Why is everyone suddenly pointing fingers at Democrats and demanding that they do something? They aren’t the ones in power at the moment. What would you have them do? Say pretty please with sugar on top stop what you are doing Mr. Musk? Give me a break. How many spineless Republicans are staying silent and protecting and defending the Jackass In Chief and his Co-President Musk?

  35. Everybody out here screaming “DO SOMETHING” but ain’t nobody got a clue as to what…

  36. I can’t imagine the shitstorm MAGAs would have stirred up if Dems suddenly started firing all MAGA loyal employees or targeting republicans.

    Its absolutely insane how normalized Trumps behaviour is. Anyone else doing the things he does would have been a death sentence in politics.

  37. Oh now everyone wants democrats? Nah. This is a republican mess, they can clean it up. They shit the bed, they can change the sheets.

  39. I’m tired of hearing HEY DEMOCRATS REEL THE FASCISTS IN instead of HEY REPUBLICANS WHAT THE FUCK ARE YOU DOING??

    Why are REPUBLICANS not holding Republicans accountable for their actions?

    And I already know the answer, it’s because they want this, then why is that not the story?

    It’s infuriating.

  40. I like how he’s blaming Democrats and not himself for giving up or any other Republican to do the same.

  41. And do *what,* exactly? Democrats have almost no power in the government.

    People love to come in and scream from the sidelines but never have any practical advice, or advice at all, for that matter.

Comments are closed.