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Musk Probably Won’t Touch The Department That Could Use Him Most

Most people would agree that a more efficient government is good. It is quite easy to acknowledge that there are parts of our government where jobs or at least some tasks can be automated in order to save taxpayers money - not to mention the stress on workers knowing things could be done better. Implementation of appropriate guardrails and anticipated oversight is what appears to be ignored thus far in the Musk crusade and warrants its own discussion.

Further, it is not so simple as replacing people with computers. While a larger topic – the just transition framework offers an approach that does not equate technology with job loss, but sees it as an empowering and planned addition and extension of work. Many of us have been in a position doing things we know are redundant or useless like inputting data from a form filled out by hand.

Again, up for discussion is tactics, authority, and ancillary activities, but an upgrade of federal IT systems, better integration across government and vertically with state and local entities, and just general efficiency is good and an area that has been lacking. Attempting to address it is not new, but there can be optimism for this attempt.

However, one of the best opportunities the Department of Government Efficiency has yet to touch – and likely won’t – is the systems of the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, and Firearms (ATF).

Current law prevents the ATF from digitizing hundreds of millions of records, instead storing them as paper copies. In the heat of investigations regarding threats or already committed acts of violence, ATF employees often have to spend weeks manually digging through records.

When a firearm seller goes out of business, they deliver their paper records to West Virginia where they are stored and a year-plus backlog sits, never allowed to be digitally searchable. Even when a business has digital records of their own, those are not to be passed on to the ATF which, by law, may never electronically search its own records.

This situation is not due to a lack of available technology or even bureaucratic intransigence - as may be seen in other agencies - but rather an intentional hamstringing.

Though many of the administration’s actions and priorities are riddled with contradiction, this area represents one of the starker choices. Many agree that Trump’s brand of Republicanism has no regard for the public debt except when it may be politically useful.

But even without factoring in the efficiencies to be gained through digitization of these records, failure to do so actively hinders law enforcement at all levels. The FBI’s databases cannot connect with the ATF’s paper records, affecting time sensitive investigations and not allowing for potential connections to be made that could uncover larger crime networks.

Ironically, as the federal government is frustrated over its inability to collaborate locally on immigration, it is local police that are held up in pursuing investigations due to the federal government taking weeks to provide information.

Some falsely try to set up the decision to modernize as a choice between guns and efficiency or even privacy and efficiency. In this case, though, efficiency and law enforcement priorities could go hand in hand.

Of course, the government and private entities galore have our data. And even the biggest gun “advocates” tend to acknowledge safety and the need for some basic controls. As such, they allow the existence of this office (ATF) in the first place and its process to address crimes.

However, if they truly supported that, they would be fine with the digitization of those records so crimes can be solved faster and less taxpayer money is spent on manual tasks.

Further, Musk’s goal of reducing government property could be achieved if massive space is not needed, including dozens of storage containers, for physical records by ATF.

Again, I strongly contest the dichotomy of reducing the national debt versus gun ownership presented by this situation, but I also believe there is a clear solution that “DOGE” is obligated to address.

The US – federal and state governments – are grossly behind other countries. There have been decade-plus delays in REAL ID rollout (goes into effect this week after 10+ years), failure to implement nationwide interoperable tolling, and more while other countries have digital IDs and helpful apps for all sorts of government services.

The IRS’ free Direct File was a revolutionary way to save taxpayers money and seems to align with the mission of tech-first, efficient processes, but recent attacks on it demonstrate that efficiency is not actually the “DOGE” priority when there are conflicts with other “beliefs.”

Similarly, the digitization of ATF records is likely going to face the same fate of “we’ll just ignore that massive inefficiency.”

If the US were serious about addressing some of the general issues affecting drug trafficking and migration, including violence in Mexico, it might begin by taking a harder look at how to stop guns from getting to Mexico and, when they are there, perhaps collaborating with Mexico to better determine how they got there.

It may be possible to uncover cross-border illegal operations by figuring out where these guns were bought in the US, by whom, and then seeing how they got into Mexico. In doing so, our investigators might be better able to target the “worst of the worst” in both countries and choke off the flow of illegal goods going in both directions.

Yes, acknowledging the US has any role to play in the situation – as both demand for drugs and supplier of weapons – is difficult for many people and ignoring it allows for the current situation to continue unabated. At best, individual smuggling events may be stopped with more attention on the border, but the system will not crumble the way many want to see.

While potentially useful, before jumping to the creation of a digital chatbot for internal departments and even citizens to interact with government services, perhaps we should get our paper records sorted first.

How Do We Sustain With Age From Here?

Most people are not a fan of our ever-growing national debt. We like efficiency. We acknowledge that the social security system should not be running on a coding language that many people do not even understand anymore.

But reducing the debt and talking about efficiency can not only be done in an orderly way, but also with a dual goal of improving citizen interaction with government. For better or worse, people’s trust in government is often tied directly to certain interactions and services they experience. Waiting in a long line at the DMV can correlate to perceptions of incumbent county and state governments. Whether that is fair is another question for the political scientists, but in our era of anti-incumbency generally, without succumbing to an entirely technocratic approach, politicians and officials should be actively seeking efficiency, at least in the way that citizens and taxpayers experience government at the most basic levels, to maintain their jobs. A more efficient government can also be a better government. Currently, on all sides, we are constrained by the false idea of mutual exclusivity.

Peace,

Kyle