Washington — A federal judge on Thursday issued a temporary injunction preventing the White House’s Department of Government Efficiency from accessing systems at the Social Security Administration that hold sensitive information belonging to millions of Americans, marking yet another setback for President Trump’s federal government reform initiatives.
U.S. District Judge Ellen Hollander stated in her 137-page ruling that a coalition of unions contesting DOGE’s access to SSA’s records is likely to prevail on claims that these actions breach the Privacy Act and a federal statute governing the rulemaking process.
She granted the labor unions’ request for a temporary restraining order following a lawsuit they filed in February, which challenged the legality of the SSA’s decision to permit DOGE to access sensitive and confidential information related to countless Americans.
“The defense does not seem to share concern for the privacy of the millions of Americans whose SSA records were made available to DOGE affiliates without their consent, and which include sensitive, confidential, and personally identifiable information,” noted Hollander, who was appointed by former President Barack Obama.
The judge’s ruling prevents SSA officials from allowing DOGE access to the systems holding Americans’ personal information. It also mandates that Elon Musk, DOGE, and its team members delete all non-anonymized personal data acquired from the SSA, and prohibits them from accessing any agency computer or software code.
The Justice Department has indicated that 10 members of the DOGE team are currently working at the SSA, with seven of them having accessed personal information stored in its databases.
In her ruling, Hollander remarked that the Trump administration failed to provide a compelling justification for DOGE’s need to access the data in SSA’s systems to identify fraud and abuse.
“Defendants neglected to follow established protocols for proper hiring, onboarding, training, and access limitations, hastily granting access to a substantial amount of sensitive, confidential data to members of the DOGE Team, without any explained necessity for doing so,” she stated.
The judge criticized the Justice Department for withholding the names of DOGE team members in an attempt to protect their privacy while permitting access to the personal information of millions of Americans.
She remarked that the Trump administration “has not demonstrated the same level of care with the far more sensitive, confidential data of millions of Americans who entrusted their government with their personal information. The trust appears to have been breached, without a clear reason.”
“The public may very well support the Trump administration’s mission to eliminate fraud, waste, and inefficiencies in federal agencies, including SSA, where they exist. However, the means and methods employed are crucial,” Hollander commented. “The DOGE Team appears to be conducting a fishing expedition at SSA, in search of fraud based on little more than suspicion.”
She accused the Trump administration of granting DOGE “unfettered access” to the private data of millions of Americans, including their Social Security numbers, medical records, drivers’ license numbers, banking and credit card information, tax details, income and employment history, and home and work addresses.
“This intrusion into the personal lives of millions of Americans—without an adequate justification for the necessity—is not in the public interest,” she asserted. “Certainly, rooting out potential fraud, waste, and mismanagement at SSA serves the public interest. However, that does not permit the government to disregard the law in pursuit of such objectives. The president’s advisors and staff are not exempt from the laws Congress enacted to safeguard American citizens against excessive and unwarranted access to their personal information.”
