Sometime between March 3 and March 7, Robert F. Kennedy Jr.’s Health & Human Services (HHS) granted Elon Musk’s DOGE team access to the Federal Parent Locator System and trained them on how to use it. The system facilitates child support payments and includes income and federal benefits data for nearly every U.S. worker.
Musk and his team have pushed the Internal Revenue Service (IRS) for access to taxpayer records for weeks. Those records are protected by federal law, as are the records in the Federal Parent Locator System. With access to the child support system, Musk may no longer need the IRS to find the information he’s looking for.
Over the last several weeks, billionaire Elon Musk’s DOGE team has clashed with civil servants over attempts to access privileged information or systems kept by the Treasury Department, IRS and Social Security Administration, among other agencies… Several experts and government officials described [the Federal Parent Locator System] as perhaps the most sensitive of all.
The Washington Post
According to the reporting, at least one career civil servant at HHS who objected to giving Musk access to the system was fired.
While most reporting on this story has focused on the child support angle, sources said DOGE was “particularly interested in a component of the system known as the National Directory of New Hires, which draws on data reported by employers and state agencies.” It’s possible this system may help in the Trump administration’s efforts to weaponize the U.S. government against influential anti-Trump activists, journalists, and organizations.
The child support payment system is maintained by HHS’s Administration for Children and Families (ACF). It is protocol for outside agencies to access the system only under tight security measures and only when necessary.
Related to child support, Musk has at least 13 living children and is not currently married to any of their mothers.
