In Elon Musk’s government efficiency posted yesterday on X, or in his role in overseeing the Doge Ministry Orders for all federal workers I’ll report what they did last week. Otherwise, you will be considered a resignation. This bomb is the IRS, the Social Security Agency and other agencies that store your personal information as Doge’s team of workers continues to zero and zero after the next agency.
One institution the president wants to erase is Consumer Financial Protection BureauCFPB – created to protect Americans from financial fraud and shady lending practices. The Doge team had wide access to the station’s computers. What are they looking for? Are they downloading files? Do you want to remove them? We don’t know.
Rohit Chopra He was the director of the CFPB until February 1st, when he was fired by President Trump. It was the first salvo against the station.
Lesley Stahl: Most people have never heard of CFPB. Why were you targeted?
Rohit Chopra: That’s very suspicious right now. It’s a rather small agency. But what’s interesting here is that the companies that CFPB overseen are actually the largest and most powerful.
Leslie Stahl: What do you like?
Rohit Chopra: The biggest Wall Street Bank, the largest credit card company, and the largest tech company in Silicon Valley, increasingly lurking in banking and finance.
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Lesley Stahl: And don’t these companies like it?
Rohit Chopra: Well, why do they do that?
Leslie Stahl: Right, why?
Rohit Chopra: They want a situation where the agency is a rap dog, not a watchdog.
The Watchdog Bureau, created by Congress, was the brainchild of Senator Elizabeth Warren.
Sen. Elizabeth Warren (in the midst of CFPB protest): After the 2008 financial crash and the bailout of big banks, Congress created the CFPB to prevent people from being attacked.
She is now leading a difficult fight to keep the bureau alive.
Senator Elizabeth Warren (CFPB protest): For everyone who wants to buy a home without being scam, this fight is your battle. Please say it with us for all the students who want to go to school without being scam. This is your battle. Oh, and for all Americans looking for your personal private data and not wanting the strange Elon Musk to smoke, this is your fight.
President Trump (Oval Office): Pocahontas, Pocahontas, fakes, fakers.
Senator Warren’s connections mean that the president and conservatives generally dismiss the institution as a woken radical seat.
President Trump (Oval Office): It was a bad group of people running it… it was a bad group of people. They really destroyed a lot of people.
Reporter (Oval Office): Can you confirm that your goal is to eliminate it completely?
President Trump (Oval Office): I would say so because we are trying to get rid of waste, fraud and abuse.
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Eliminating waste, fraud and abuse is the job the president gave to Elon Musk and Doge. However, eliminating the institutions that regulate high-tech companies creates the possibility of a conflict of interest for masks, especially given the secrets of the project.
Elon Musk (Oval Office): You won’t know if your organization is more transparent than your DOGE organization. And you can see: am I doing something that would benefit one of my companies? That’s completely obvious.
If there is one thing that the Doge operation is not, it is obvious or transparent. Take small teams with them given access to the station’s computer. These are rare, verified photos of three team members entering the building on Friday, February 7th.
Hanna Hickman: I heard from a colleague that they were camping in the basement. And they have papers in the window to prevent people from looking. And they certainly have access to data.
Hannah Hickman was a lawyer here until a week and a half ago.
Leslie Stahl: Who are these people?
Hanna Hickman: Software Engineer, University Dropout, Certainly Nobody
Leslie Stahl: College dropout?
Hannah Hickman: That’s what we’ve heard. I think that transparency may make people feel more confident about what is happening.
Three hours after they swept, Elon Musk posted this on X: “CFPB RIP” – rest in peace. That day, President Trump appointed him. Russell Vertavid critic of the bureau, acting director, and he announced he would cease funding the agency at X: “Spigot is now off.”
He then emailed the employee to tell them to “stop everything.” The building was locked. The firing began soon. Hanna Hickman and nearly 200 colleagues found it in a large number of emails.
President Trump (Miami Summit): We effectively close out of control CFPB, escort radical plastering officials from the building, and lock the door behind it.
Meanwhile, inside the back of a locked door, a team of young men was drilled into the basement and rarely left, except to pick up lunch orders from Chipotle.
According to some sources, they were granted unprecedented access to CFPB data systems, including sensitive bank records – access requiring training and background checks.
Leslie Stahl: Have you examined it?
Hannah Hickman: Of course.
Leslie Stahl: How did you judge?
Hanna Hickman: All staff at the department must do background checks before being hired. This includes making sure we are the person we say to talk to our background, fingerprints, neighbors and friends. This is a process that takes at least several months to get hired.
CFPB’s chief operating officer has signed the NDA with the declaration of oath that the young worker has been “provided with privacy and cybersecurity training.” However, in response, the main engineer who simply resigned, wrote, “… these trainings alone won’t be enough…”
Lorelei Salas: I’m worried that your account number, your Social Security number is there.
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Lorelei Salas and Eric Halperin are the highest-ranking civil servants leaving the bureau. After they were placed on administrative leave, both resigned.
Eric Halperin was in charge of all departmental lawsuits on behalf of fraudulent consumers. Both say they are frightening at the ideas of people running through the station’s confidential files.
Eric Halperin: So we have both unique consumer-oriented business information, trade secrets, and personal identifiable information that we collect during the course of our work that we need to do our job. If you are a company, you want to keep that information private and maintain its confidentiality.
Lorelei Salas ran a team of nearly 600 inspectors who surveyed books from banks and other financial institutions.
Lorelei Salas: I think that the companies that provided us with financial information and trade secrets will likely be harmed if that information is in the hands of competitors. So, for example, in recent years, companies have been using artificial intelligence to create models and decide whether to get a loan.
Lesley Stahl: Is it on the computer?
Lorelei Salas: It’s in our system.
Lesley Stahl: Is the algorithm in the system?
Lorelei Salas: Yes.
Lesley Stahl: So what computers have is a secret source that competitors can get a lot from knowing.
Lorelei Salas: That’s true.
Leslie Stahl: I’m sure American companies will start thinking about this –
Lorelei Salas: They’re not happy.
In recent years, the bureau has actively started police for digital banking companies and products. This could be related to Elon Musk as they announced they would be launching a new digital payments platform, X Money.
Lesley Stahl: Does Elon Musk endure to get something from these files?
Hannah Hickman: Absolutely. His company X is moving into the digital payment space. So he could potentially have access to competitor files, such as the Venmo and Cash apps. He can take out the regulators who would have been his company’s watchdog. I think it’s easier to fire us than to beat us in court.
A senior White House official said Elon Musk is not in the internal structure of Doge Operation at CFPB. The young man receives an order from the station’s representative director. When I asked them what they were doing specifically, the answer was: no comments.
Lesley Stahl: Should this agency exist?
Norbert Michelle: No, we didn’t need it –
Leslie Stahl: No?
Norbert Michelle: No. There was no need for another federal agency in the first place.
Norbert Michel of the Libertarian Cato Institute agrees that there are too many financial regulatory bodies.
Norbert Michel: Looking at the large US financial institutions, there are about 12 federal regulators in and you can look into it. Why is it necessary? Consumer protection existed long before the CFPB was present. And if we removed it and put it all back together, we would still have consumer protection, as it is.
Lesley Stahl: But this came from the 2008 financial crisis when people felt that consumers were not protected. The banks were protected, but the little ones were not. If they abolish this Consumer Bureau, where will the feature go?
Norbert Michel: Well, the wisest thing is probably going to put it all on the Federal Trade Commission. Because it’s the main federal consumer protection agency. Their motto is literally on the “Protecting American Consumers” website.
The bureau has recovered more than $20 billion for consumers, but late last week, the demolition and disappearing act was there for everyone when workers knocked down the building’s signs. The federal judge imposed a temporary restraining order to stop the bailout cuts and further fired him. The hearing is set for March 3rd. This order does not cover those already fired, like Hannah Hickman.
Leslie Stahl: Are you resigned?
Hanna Hickman: No. Under the usual regulations governing government layoffs, you should help move to a new role to receive at least 60 days of notification, retirement and benefits. It’s shocking. Civil servants have protection.
Leslie Stahl: Is there any way?
Hannah Hickman: I hope so. And our union is already fighting back. We are looking for all the legal means to pursue this. At the end of the day, the administration believes we can escape because we don’t think we have anything to ask for. So I want to prove they’re wrong.
At present, CFPB investigations and almost all lawsuits have been frozen. And former director Rohit Chopra says there are no refund checks for fraudulent consumers.
Leslie Stahl: Do you say there’s a station right now?
Rohit Chopra: I don’t know now. What I know is that many employees are told to stay silent and stay home.
Leslie Stahl: Important Question: Where is the Council?
Rohit Chopra: Well, Congress is the one who makes laws. You can’t say “we will pass these laws to protect consumers.” And the agency behaves like a dead fish. That’s not how the constitution works.
Lesley Stahl: The President cannot close administrative agency.
Rohit Chopra: Generally speaking, agents are established by law. The removal of agents will also be done through Congress. What I can say is that the uncertainty about this is a great signal for the industry that they can escape by cheating.
Manufactured by Shachar Bar-on. Associate producers Jinsol Jung and Milera Brusani. Broadcast Associate Aria Een. Edited by Sean Kelly.
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