‘DOGE has broken into our building’: Federal bureaucrats panic, call cops for ‘illegal takeover’

Officials at the U.S. Institute of Peace (USIP) called police Monday in a failed effort to block personnel from Elon Musk’s Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) from entering their Washington headquarters.

Former USIP officials insisted DOGE had no authority to enter the building and remove its staff, claiming the institute operates independently of executive branch control despite operating almost entirely on federal funding. USIP, established by Congress in 1984, claims its mission is to “prevent violent conflicts and broker peace deals abroad,” despite the U.S. having been involved in numerous military interventions, prolonged wars and rising global instability in the decades since.

“DOGE has broken into our building,” George Moose, USIP’s acting president until his dismissal last week, told reporters Monday. “What has happened here is an illegal takeover by elements of the executive branch of a private non-profit.”