Michael Lewis on the ‘Blockers’ who fought DOGE

SPEAKER_1 (0:00)

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SPEAKER_2 (0:17)

WBUR podcasts, Boston.

Michael Lewis (0:22)

She is the human being between your tax return and a White House that might use it as a weapon against you.

Kalyani Saxena (0:29)

After DOGE fired critical, non-partisan federal workers, who stands between you and the government?

It's Wednesday, October 14th, and this is Here and Now Anytime from NPR and WBUR Boston. I'm Kalyani Saxena. Today on the show, we've got a special conversation, and it involves a trip down memory lane. You probably remember last year when droves of federal workers were pushed out of civil service, thanks to the efforts of Elon Musk's Department of Government Efficiency. DOGE only lasted a few months, but we're still feeling the impacts of those cuts, and probably still will for years to come.

The initiative was billed as a way to cut federal spending, but in the end, it failed to do that in a meaningful way. Instead, it hollowed out several government agencies. So what was it like for the workers who were forced out, and what happened to the work that they did? Well, there's a new book out through the eyes of the career civil servants who fought back. It's called Blockers, Rebels in the Deep State, by journalist and author Michael Lewis. And he spoke with Scott Tong about the book.

Scott Tong (1:55)

We remember, it hasn't been that long, how DOGE and its head Elon Musk denigrated federal workers, right? What is your top line takeaway after writing this book about these paper pushers, bureaucrats, and whether they matter to me, to you?

SPEAKER_6 (2:09)

Yeah.

Michael Lewis (2:10)

So I started diving into the civil service for literary material into Trump's first term. So I've spent a lot of time wandering around the various agencies and getting to know these people.

There's a reason I'm still here.

I think there's a big problem with the stereotype there, like lazy, inefficient, all that stuff.

SPEAKER_2 (2:27)

You hear it, right? You hear it all the time. Every election cycle, they're just pounded.

Michael Lewis (2:31)

The reason there is a book to write is the stereotype is so false.

Scott Tong (2:35)

Yeah.

Michael Lewis (2:35)

We drink this water and feel safe because someone has figured out a way and it isn't the private sector. What I have found is that if you actually can get them to talk and tell their stories, there's usually not just an interesting what they're doing, but the why they're doing it.

Scott Tong (2:54)

The word blockers is, as you write in the book, Elon Musk's word.

Michael Lewis (2:59)

It's not a football term.

Scott Tong (3:01)

Not a football term. You've written enough about sports for now, but people in the government who are getting in the way of DOGE, and as he puts it, they don't understand our vision. They don't understand what we're trying to do here. But one of the blockers I want to ask you about, Kathleen Walters at the IRS, I portrayed as one of these paper pushers who doesn't get it. She so cares about a lot of things. Tell me about her.

Michael Lewis (3:25)

I grew up in rural Pennsylvania, was a superstar student and athlete, went to Georgetown, gets a big corporate law job, and finds it soulless. In fact, all her life really wanted to go into public service. The only place that offered her a job 20 something years ago is the IRS. She never imagined she wanted to work for it. The one place she wouldn't want to work, because who does? She gets in there and she finds this incredible sense of mission. She ends up being the Chief Privacy Officer, which means she is the human being between your tax return and a White House that might use it as a weapon against you. It's like the tax data is sacred. We protect it with very strict privacy laws. Her job is to make sure those laws are followed.

Right after the inauguration, she starts to get pressured to give up a database of 7 million tax returns. A 26-year-old comes in and starts harassing her for various things and tries to fire her.

She has the keys to all the offices on her floor and she ends up hiding in conference. It's hide and seek. She takes the view that if she can just escape, evade him till six o'clock at night, he'll forget and she'll be able to come back the next morning. But the real pressure was coming from DHS, something called the ICE Innovation Lab.