Elon Musk says the judge who temporarily blocked political appointees, including from the Department of Government Efficiency, from accessing payment systems in the Treasury Department should be impeached.

U.S. District Judge Paul Engelmayer drew Mr. Musk’s ire hours after he issued an order in response to a lawsuit filed by 19 state attorneys general claiming the DOGE squad had no authority to access the systems with sensitive information, including bank account numbers.

“A corrupt judge protecting corruption,” Mr. Musk said early Sunday morning on X. “He needs to be impeached NOW!”

Mr. Engelmayer’s temporary restraining order blocks the government from “granting access to all political appointees, special government employees, and government employees detailed from an agency outside the Treasury Department, to any Treasury Department payment record, payment systems, or any other data systems maintained by the Treasury Department containing personally identifiable information and/or confidential financial information of payees.”

It also orders those who did access the system to “destroy any and all copies of material downloaded from the Treasury Department’s records and systems.”

Democrats have been trying to slow the Musk-led DOGE team’s quest to dismantle the federal bureaucracy.

They cried foul last week after learning that Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent had granted the DOGE team access to the system.

The Trump administration has maintained that DOGE had “read only” access to the federal payment system.

• Seth McLaughlin can be reached at smclaughlin@washingtontimes.com.