FTA:

Other high-profile buildings soon to go on the market include the Hubert H. Humphrey Building (home to the Department of Health and Human Services), the Frances Perkins Building (which houses the Department of Labor), and even GSA's own headquarters--a striking acknowledgment that the agency itself is not immune to the restructuring.

GSA did not say where the thousands of federal workers housed in these buildings would work or speculate on what entity would buy such buildings. The Trump administration has been pressuring workers who had been telecommuting to work in person.

What's staying? GSA emphasized that it will retain properties deemed critical to government operations, including courthouses, land ports of entry, and facilities essential to national defense and law enforcement.

Sounds like a plan con artist real estate developer would love:

John Skiles Skinner
@skiles.bsky.social

Imagine DOGE opens your mail and finds your household electric bill. To eliminate this cost, they burn your house down without warning. Then they total up the bills that, as a homeless person, you will never again pay. On its website, DOGE boasts about the money it has saved you.

DOGE did this to 18F, and now they are doing it to the rest of GSA. They destroy things of great value to the public, tell the public about the small "savings" that result from that destruction, and do not mention the far larger costs.

It is a simple accounting trick: DOGE keeps a one-sided ledger.

Lacking a column for losses, the ledger reports gain after gain to you as your public assets are sold off.

The GSA is the landowner of public buildings. The people who took over our government presumably plan to sell these buildings to themselves in the current discounted market for office space.

They will tell the American people they have saved us money by making us homeless.

Presumably there will be vast waste in the liquidation of GSA too. Public dollars become private dimes.

Owning buildings is generally far cheaper for the government than leasing. I predict DOGE will throw away that efficiency as quickly as possible.

This is the takeover of the Gov from the People by the Corporations.
Soon, you local Pay Day Scam Loans guy will loan you the money to pay your mortgage to the Musk Tiny Homes Company.... and sell you the Building Permit for that addition.
#2 | Posted by Corky

It's a scam alright:

Dave Sund @davesund.bsky.social
This is pretty much the vulture capitalist playbook so it's no surprise that Musk is running it.

Victoria Ward @hotspurstudio.bsky.social
This is an accurate analogy. But it isn't just Musk, it is a world wide movement that all right wing gov'ts want to adopt. See Argentina.

They could sell a lot more if they didn't demonize working from home.
Too soon?
#9 | Posted by Imshakinitboss

I think the plan is to eliminate almost all of the federal work force, to privatize the small amount that's left and replace human workers with AI wherever possible. For example:

Sam Stein
@samsteindc.bsky.social

NEW: In an email obtained by The Bulwark, the acting Social Security administrator made clear they're going to outsource-privatize operations. The expectation is it will be the call centers that seniors depend on.

Elon Is Coming for Your Social Security

[In a March 1 email, Lee Dudek, the acting SSA commissioner, wrote:]

"We need to double down on our greatest strength " the field. We need to revitalize SSA operations by streamlining activities, outsource non-essential functions to industry experts, and reinstating human judgment and common sense into every decision at every level."

What did Dudek mean by "outsource non-essential functions"? He doesn't elaborate in the rest of the email. But Martin O'Malley, who ran the SSA under Joe Biden, suggested Dudek's plans could include automation and the use of AI to replace live human beings in call centers. This would, he says, be a total disaster.

#15 | Posted by Dbt2

Yes, I agree people are not connecting the dots and recognizing the big picture goal behind all of this. They aren't just coming for Medicaid or Medicare or Social Security or or or or. They are coming for the whole damn government, and there doesn't seem to be anything anyone can do to stop them. Republicans have literally been planning this for decades. Trump does have an important role to play in that I doubt a President McCain or a President Romney would have been this ruthless and unconscionable.