DOGE has taken over the American Institute of Peace. Now the interior looks like a zombie film, reveals the head of security
In March, agents with DOGE, the Billionaire Elon Musk’s Ministry of Efficiency Elon Musk, took control of the American Peace Institute (USIP), a non -profit organization funded by the Congress and quasi -government – but entirely independent – following a spectacular case with staff members.
While the DOGE team was making their way in the head office and the glass designed by Moshe Safdie of the Institute at the northwest corner of the National Mall, local police and FBI agents ejected everyone from the building, notably the president of the George Moose Institute, a career diplomat that has served for more than 30 years under republican and democratic administrations.
The Institute was created in 1984 by Republican President Ronald Reagan with a mission declared to advance international stability and promote the global conflict resolution. However, less than a month after Donald Trump’s last term as president, he published a decree which was aimed at USIP as “useless”.
DOGE then quickly dismissed the workforce of the USIP and replaced its board of directors with Loyalists Maga, after which the alleged cost reduction agency locked the doors to $ 500 million and has moved mainly – attract rats and cockroaches and let the conditions have fun to such an extent that the installation will probably require hundreds of dollars in repairs, according to USIP Chief of Security, the security colonist.
O’Brien, with a contractual engineer, was the first to deeply inspect the institute’s building last month after a federal judge declared the takeover of illegal Doge, judging his actions as “null and not avenue”.
O’Brien, a veteran of the American army who then worked in the police before joining the USIP in August 2023, said that what he had found was, in a word, “offensive”. The offices that have been abandoned for two months looked like a scene from a zombie apocalypse film, Frozen in Time, with everything that was exactly when the house was cleaned, according to O’Brien.
And that, he said, was precisely the problem.
“Whoever manages large commercial buildings understands that maintenance is not something that you can simply stop doing for two months,” said O’Brien The independent. “After Doge took over, they canceled many contracts and critical functions have stopped performing.”
The rodents have become a problem because Doge employees have neglected to clean up everything that remains in the scene after taking over, said O’Brien. USIP had a coffee managed by an entrepreneur, food being stored on the spot, he said. In addition, O’Brien said, the USIP staff had food in the refrigerators throughout the building, as well as snacks, they did not have the possibility of withdrawing offices and cabinets before Doge brings them to the property.
Over the next eight weeks, Dogi would not leave any USIP staff in the building and did nothing to prevent foods that run away from spoiling, which quickly attracted vermin.
The cockroaches were also attracted to the perishable abandoned throughout the space, entering through wastewater and the drainage pipes which had dried for lack of use, said O’Brien.
“There were also several water leaks that contributed to their ability to enter the building,” he added.
Beyond the various infestations, O’Brien recalled that, among other things, the ceiling tiles mysteriously lacked in the building, the water damage was endemic, the vehicle barriers had become non -operational and the weeds grew in the cooling tower on the roof – a potential vector for legionaries’ disease. Since the location was left without adequate security, graffiti also appeared on an external wall.
“These things can be transformed into major repairs of $ 100,000 for lack of maintenance,” said O’Brien. “Now we are in a hurry to play catching up.”
However, according to O’Brien, the problems “have exceeded maintenance”.
“They torn the main logo of the wall when you arrive in the hall, and even if we are most of the rooms, would you be surprised that we still miss four letters: U, S, I and P?” Said O’Brien. “It is not a coincidence.”
More than a dozen USIP flags have also been removed from their males and remained un recognés, which, according to O’Brien, was taken, as well as the remains of USIP logo, as “war trophies”.
He called for the “unexplored” situation and has difficulty putting the words of the mixture of emotions he felt by returning to the USIP building.
“The closest thing you can compare is the McCarthyism, and even it turns out to the total destruction that occurs at the moment,” said O’Brien.
USIP O’Brien colleagues are “the group of most incredible people, who care to make the world better”, often to the detriment of their own health and their personal security, he continued. While the current administration claims to consider USIP programs as consumable, the Institute in fact increased in the first round of Trump depending on 2016 to 2020.
For O’Brien, disconnection is massive.
“”[Trump] Served on January 20, and in his inauguration speech, he said: “I am a peacemaker,” said O’Brien. “USIP is the only private institution funded by the public which is dedicated to developed world peace. We are unique, with a 40 -year inheritance to try to do the right thing and make this world a little better. »»
Regardless of political affiliation, USIP men and women are always ready to cooperate with the Trump administration, but necessary “in order to leave the world a little better than we have found it”, according to O’Brien.
“It is not that we are against the administration or against Trump,” he said. “It’s that we are ready to do this job with anyone.”
On May 19, the American district judge Beryl Howell ruled that the seizure of Doge of the USIP had been illegal and ordered that Moose and his staff were restored. By giving back his opinion, Howell said that “Trump’s efforts here to resume an organization … represented a blatant usurpation of power and a means of leading government affairs which unnecessarily traumatized committed leadership and USIP employees, which deserved better.”
As USIP again presupposes control of his building, Musk left Doge because his 130 -day mandate as “employee of the special government” ends. The agency formed in a hurry only managed a fraction of its discounts of promised spending, while paralyzing a raft of vital government programs and would have brought Trump to ask: “Was the bulls ** t?”
The 80 -year -old moose now has an intimidating task in the reconstruction and revival of the USIP, according to O’Brien, who insisted that he “would take a bullet” for his boss “without hesitation”.
“It is this kind of person, a wonderful man, a great leader and something to respect,” said O’Brien. “Roll or die, I stand next to him.”
DOGE officials did not respond to requests for comments.
