Judge temporarily blocks DOGE from accessing sensitive Social Security data
A federal judge on Thursday barred U.S. DOGE Service employees from accessing sensitive Social Security Administration data and ordered members of the team led by Elon Musk to delete any personally identifiable information it has obtained from the agency.
On the broad premise of rooting out fraud within the federal government, about a dozen Musk-aligned tech engineers gained access to databases containing reams of taxpayer information. In February, a clash about DOGE’s access to sensitive data spurred the then-acting commissioner of the SSA, Michelle King, to leave her job about a month after being appointed to the role.
In a scathing 137-page ruling issued Thursday, Judge Ellen Lipton Hollander in the U.S. District Court for the District of Maryland wrote that DOGE “essentially engaged in a fishing expedition at SSA, in search of a fraud epidemic, based on little more than suspicion.”
“To facilitate this expedition, SSA provided members of the SSA DOGE Team with unbridled access to the personal and private data of millions of Americans,” she wrote. That included access to “Social Security numbers, medical records, mental health records, hospitalization records, drivers’ license numbers, bank and credit card information, tax information, income history, work history, birth and marriage certificates, and home and work addresses.”
The administration's defendants, along with “so-called experts on the DOGE Team, never identified or articulated even a single reason for which the DOGE Team needs unlimited access to SSA’s entire record systems, thereby exposing personal, confidential, sensitive, and private information that millions of Americans entrusted to their government,” Hollander added.
“Ironically, the identity of these DOGE affiliates has been concealed because defendants are concerned that the disclosure of even their names would expose them to harassment and thus invade their privacy,” Hollander, an appointee of President Barack Obama, wrote. “The defense does not appear to share a privacy concern for the millions of Americans whose SSA records were made available to the DOGE affiliates, without their consent.”
Thursday’s temporary restraining order — which the judge put in place for two weeks — bars SSA officials from sharing personally identifiable information with DOGE. It orders DOGE team members and affiliates to delete non-anonymized SSA data in their possession.
The order also bars DOGE team members and affiliates from installing any software on SSA systems and devices, and orders the removal of any software installed on SSA systems on their behalf since Inauguration Day. Additionally, it bars DOGE team members and affiliates from accessing, altering or disclosing any SSA computer code.
Notably, it does not prevent SSA from giving DOGE access to anonymized data, and DOGE team members can obtain narrow access to non-anonymized data under specific conditions set by the court.
The White House did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
The ruling Thursday was the latest legal setback as DOGE and the Trump administration works to cut the size of the federal workforce and reshape government agencies.
The lawsuit was brought by two labor unions and an advocacy group, which argued that DOGE’s access to their members’ personal information posed major risks.
“The court recognized the real and immediate dangers of DOGE’s reckless actions and took action to stop it. This is important not only for the millions of Americans whose personal data was at risk,” Skye Perryman, president and chief executive of Democracy Forward — a plaintiff organization in the case — said in a statement.
Lee Saunders, the president of another organization that brought the case — the American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees — underscored in a statement that Thursday’s court order “will not only force [DOGE] to delete any data they have currently saved, but it will also block them from further sharing, accessing or disclosing our Social Security information.”
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Lisa Rein contributed.