What did Donald Trump do today?

He and a 19-year-old nicknamed "bigballs" started illegally dismantling government agencies and punishing post-Apartheid South Africa.

Mega-billionaire and South African immigrant Elon Musk runs the so-called "Department of Government Efficiency," which—at least in theory—reports to Trump. Over the weekend, Musk's agents have been seizing control of key government systems related to employment and payments. The people involved have, for the most part, refused to identify themselves to the public. Today, Wired reported out the names of at six of them, all men ranging in age from 19 to 24. They are Akash Bobba,  Luke Farritor, Gautier Cole Killian, Gavin Kliger, Ethan Shaotran, and Edward Coristine—a 19-year-old intern at Musk's troubled brain-research company Neuralink, also known by his chosen internet nickname of "bigballs."

Musk has been trying to draw attention to himself all day by unilaterally shutting off contracted government payments to various organizations and agencies without explanation. Not only does Trump (and therefore Musk, or any of his anonymous "DOGE" volunteers) have no authority to cancel payments for debts authorized by Congress, but they are under a court order to not illegally freeze funds while his earlier attempts are litigated. 

Musk's targets today have included a suite of Lutheran social relief organizations, contracted by the United States government to provide services for Americans and refugees in disaster areas abroad. Musk called this "illegal" and quoted Trump's disgraced former national security advisor, Michael Flynn, questioning whether Lutheranism was even a real religion or just a "money-laundering" operation. (Roughly 3 million Americans are Lutherans.)

Musk also said that the United States Agency for International Development (USAID), an independent agency established by Congress in 1961, a "criminal organization" and that it was "time for it to die." People claiming to be acting on Musk's authority tried and eventually succeeded in gaining access to USAID's files today. This included highly classified information that, if released, could endanger American aid workers abroad or the populations they serve.

Neither Trump nor Musk has any legal authority to disband or disable independent government agencies. 

There was one other major development in government funding tonight: an announcement posted under Trump's name to his private social media site. It claimed that Trump would be freezing all foreign aid to South Africa because it was "treating certain classes of people VERY BADLY." 

Thirty-one years after the end of whites-only apartheid rule, there is still racial tension in South Africa. That is aggravating a land-redistribution plan, as white farmers who have retained their land since decolonialization worry about losing economic leverage. It is not a subject that Trump appears to have ever addressed before—but it is a fixation of South African-born Elon Musk, whose inherited wealth comes from his father's various apartheid-era business ventures.

Why does this matter?

• Anonymous teenagers with no unusual technical skills should not be given the power to make the United States of America default on its debts.

• It's not clear that Trump is willing or able to act independently of Musk.