Rep. Chellie Pingree, D-1st District, takes a question from a reporter during a news conference at the Portland International Jetport on Tuesday. Pingree said her office has received thousands of calls from constituents worried about the impacts of President Donald Trump’s orders, some of which Pingree says are illegal. Ben McCanna/Portland Press Herald

Rep. Chellie Pingree’s office has received thousands of calls from “panic-stricken” Maine constituents over news that President Donald Trump has given billionaire Elon Musk access to sensitive personal information and government spending contained in U.S. Treasury records, her staff said Tuesday.

The 1st District Democrat criticized the power granted to Musk, as well as Trump’s aggressive flurry of executive orders aimed at federal spending and operations, calling them “blatantly unconstitutional” during a news conference at the Portland International Jetport before boarding a flight to Washington.

“We are just in the middle of a daily, lawless amount of chaos and confusion from the executive branch that really is trying to take over the government’s responsibility for funding,” Pingree said.

Both of Maine’s U.S. senators, Republican Susan Collins and independent Angus King, and Rep. Jared Golden, D-2nd District, also challenged on Tuesday the legal authority for Musk to take actions such as cutting spending and dismantling federal agencies without congressional approval.

Over the last two days, Pingree’s office has received over 2,000 calls — a huge spike from the usual 25 to 50 a day, according to her staff.

Pingree, who serves on the House of Representatives appropriations committee, said the “unprecedented” volume of calls are coming from a range of constituents — business owners, farmers, affordable housing developers, day care workers, health care providers and other ordinary citizens.

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Pingree’s criticism came a day before a national day of protest against Trump, including a protest in Augusta on Wednesday afternoon.

In its first two weeks, the Trump administration announced that it was freezing federal grants and loans — a move that was quickly blocked by the courts. But Pingree said that administration is continuing to withhold funding that was approved by Congress in the Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act and the Inflation Reduction Act.

“As a member of the Appropriations Committee, it’s still totally confusing about what funding is allowed and what’s blocked. We can’t get access to that information. Imagine what it’s like being one of those recipients. And we know that many of those funds are still blocked,” Pingree said.

“There is no legal way the president should be impounding those funds,” Pingree added.

Rep. Chellie Pingree, D-1st District, discusses President Donald Trump’s first two weeks during a news conference at the Portland International Jetport on Tuesday. Ben McCanna/Portland Press Herald

Pingree also criticized Trump for allowing Musk and the new Department of Government Efficiency to access Treasury records, which contain sensitive information of individuals and businesses, including Musk’s business competitors. She condemned efforts by Musk to get career workers to resign while blocking others from access to computer systems.

Musk has been classified as a temporary employee in the White House and not undergone any confirmation hearings or votes.

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Over the weekend, Musk said he and Trump were looking to eliminate the U.S. Agency for International Development, or USAID, which provides humanitarian assistance across the globe. The agency’s website was taken down, senior officials were placed on leave and thousands of contractors were laid off, The Associated Press reported.

MUSK’S ACTIONS CONCERN COLLINS

The other members of Maine’s delegation also are calling out some of the Trump administration’s early moves.

“I’m very concerned about Mr. Musk, or any of his assistants, going into federal agencies and demanding personal information on employees,” Collins told reporters in Washington on Monday, according to a social media post by Brendan Pederson, a reporter for Punchbowl News. Pederson reported that Collins said she is “not sure where the authority” comes from.

On Tuesday afternoon, a group of about 40 activists from the Midcoast gathered at the Republican’s Portland office to protest the actions taken by Musk and press Collins to reject some of Trump’s Cabinet nominees.

A group of Midcoast residents gathered at the Portland office of Sen. Susan Collins on Tuesday afternoon to protest actions by the Trump administration. Derek Davis/Portland Press Herald

King, who caucuses with Democrats, was one of 37 Democratic and independent senators to write Secretary of State Marco Rubio to express concerns about “the administration’s brazen and illegal attempts to destroy” USAID, saying the program is important for national security.

“Mass personnel furloughs of dubious legality, and abrupt, blanket stop-work orders without regard to relevant appropriations laws are causing immediate harm to U.S. national security, placing U.S. citizens at risk, disrupting life-saving work and breaking the U.S. government’s contractual obligations to private sector partners,” they wrote.

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“Foreign assistance is critical to supporting U.S. strategic interests around the world. Foreign assistance protects U.S. national security, advances U.S. values, and ensures the U.S. is the partner of choice for everything from defense procurement to cutting edge scientific research. China, Russia and Iran are already moving rapidly to exploit the vacuum and instability left by the U.S.’s sudden global retreat.”

GOLDEN ALSO GETTING CALLS

Golden said he is also getting calls from worried Mainers.

“I have been getting a lot of calls over the past few days, and the interesting thing is none of them are about Donald Trump. They’re all about Elon Musk,” the Democrat said in a written statement. “My constituents and a majority of this country put Trump in the White House, not this unelected, weirdo billionaire. Musk is stepping on the president’s toes — making decisions without his approval and pursuing his own agenda.”

Pingree said the administration’s moves are unconstitutional but that there is little she can do given that she is in the minority party. Democrats, she said, can’t sue or investigate the actions of the executive branch without the approval of Republican leaders.

The congresswoman said she’d had a general idea of how Trump’s second term would go, based on the conservative policy agenda known as Project 2025 — a document Trump tried to distance himself from before the election — and on promises that Musk’s Department of Government Efficiency would find $2 trillion in spending cuts.

“But I don’t think any of us expected this last two weeks of chaos and illegal activity,” she said.

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Russell Vought, who is credited with being the architect of Project 2025, is Trump’s nominee to lead the Office of Management and Budget.

Pingree said it’s difficult to know what will come next as lawmakers begin to take up federal spending bills and DOGE eyes dismantling the Department of Education.

She said her office will try to keep constituents as informed as they can and speak about against abuses of power.

“We’re going to continue to see the bluster and the chaos and this blatantly unconstitutional and illegal activity and were going to do everything we can to fight back for the people of Maine,” Pingree said.

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