Federal Investigators Say Some DOGE Documents Have Been Excluded

On April 14, 2025, a federal IT employee fallen a whistleblower complaint with Congress to say that the members of the so-called Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) obtained and may have released confidential information from the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB).

A few days after filing the complaint, whistleblower Dan Berulis found the brakes on his car had been cut after a minor accident near his home. Complaints, which he went public in an NPR story the day it was released, it caused an outcry, and members of Congress call for an investigation. The following month, in May 2025, FedScoop reported that the NLRB’s Office of Inspector General (OIG) opened an investigation. It’s still going on.

However, in April 2026, the Government Accountability Office (GAO)—a federal agency within the legislative branch that conducts research and investigations in Congress— published its report about DOGE’s access to NLRB systems, titled “National Labor Relations Board Details Did Not Access IT Systems Between April 16 and July 25, 2025.” The report only covers the immediate period of Berulis’ complaint, and does not address anything DOGE did before that time.

But what’s at the bottom of the report is another revelation: In August 2025, shortly after DOGE members left the NLRB but before GAO investigators “asked to look into the practices,” the agency “removed the group’s accounts in order to obtain a post-contractual disclosure of DOGE personnel details.” Essentially, this means that the digital records DOGE members obtained and when they were removed, leaving the GAO no way to verify what NLRB staff told their investigators.

Don Moynihan, a professor of public law at the University of Michigan, said: “I think you can think of another problem where the footnote is the main topic of the report. “The report raises more questions than it solves, like who deleted what they deleted.”

The NLRB enforces the laws governing unions and collective bargaining, and investigates unfair labor practices. This provides an opportunity to identify those who have a record and their evidence; information about trade secrets and other proprietary information that may be relevant to negotiations between employers and employees; and various research objects.

According to what Berulis complained about, “the officials of the DOGE organization needed the highest level of internal procedures without limits.

In the report, GAO officials noted that they “asked NLRB staff to determine the amount of access they provided on each system to the DOGE team,” but were unable to confirm whether what they were told was true because DOGE accounts and related communications had already been removed from the NLRB’s systems. It’s also unclear who from DOGE got access: Justin Fox, Nate Cavanaugh, and Jordan Wick were all at one point on the NLRB, but no specific members of DOGE were named in the report or Berulis’ original complaint.

The NLRB did not respond to a request for comment; nor Fox, Cavanaugh, or Wick.

Tesla and SpaceX, both companies owned by Elon Musk, who also chaired DOGE, have been under investigation by the NLRB. Earlier this year, the NLRB dismissed the case against SpaceX, claiming that the agency had no control over the company.

In April words In announcing the dismissal of the case, Democratic senators Warren and Richard Blumenthal wrote: “Given Musk’s financial support for President Trump in the 2024 election, his significant influence in the Trump Administration and interest in the work of the NLRB as head of the (DOGE)…