Supreme Court allows DOGE team to access Social Security systems with
data on millions of Americans
[June 07, 2025]
By LINDSAY WHITEHURST
WASHINGTON (AP) — The Supreme Court handed the Trump administration two
victories Friday in cases involving the Department of Government
Efficiency, including giving it access to Social Security systems
containing personal data on millions of Americans.
The justices also separately reined in orders seeking transparency at
DOGE, the team once led by billionaire Elon Musk.
The court's conservative majority sided with the Trump administration in
the first Supreme Court appeals involving DOGE. The three liberal
justices dissented in both cases.
The DOGE victories come amid a messy breakup between the president and
the world's richest man that started shortly after Musk’s departure from
the White House and has included threats to cut government contracts and
a call for the president to be impeached. The future of DOGE’s work
isn't clear without Musk at the helm, but both men have previously said
that it will continue its efforts.
In one case, the high court halted an order from a judge in Maryland
that has restricted the team’s access to the Social Security
Administration under federal privacy laws.
“We conclude that, under the present circumstances, SSA may proceed to
afford members of the SSA DOGE Team access to the agency records in
question in order for those members to do their work,” the court said in
an unsigned order. Conservative lower-court judges have said there’s no
evidence at this point of DOGE mishandling personal information.
The agency holds sensitive data on nearly everyone in the country,
including school records, salary details and medical information.
Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson said the court's action creates “grave
privacy risks” for millions of Americans by giving “unfettered data
access to DOGE regardless — despite its failure to show any need or any
interest in complying with existing privacy safeguards, and all before
we know for sure whether federal law countenances such access.” Justice
Sonia Sotomayor joined Jackson's opinion and Justice Elena Kagan said
she also would have ruled against the administration.
The Trump administration says DOGE needs the access to carry out its
mission of targeting waste in the federal government. Musk had been
focused on Social Security as an alleged hotbed of fraud. The
entrepreneur has described it as a “ Ponzi scheme ” and insisted that
reducing waste in the program is an important way to cut government
spending.
But U.S. District Judge Ellen Hollander in Maryland found that DOGE’s
efforts at Social Security amounted to a “fishing expedition” based on
“little more than suspicion” of fraud, and allowing unfettered access
puts Americans’ private information at risk.
Her ruling did allow access to anonymous data for staffers who have
undergone training and background checks, or wider access for those who
have detailed a specific need.
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The Trump administration has said DOGE can’t work effectively with those
restrictions.
Solicitor General D. John Sauer also argued that the ruling is an
example of federal judges overstepping their authority and trying to
micromanage executive branch agencies.
The plaintiffs say it's a narrow order that’s urgently needed to protect
personal information.
An appeals court previously refused to immediately to lift the block on
DOGE access, though it split along ideological lines. Conservative
judges in the minority said there’s no evidence that the team has done
any “targeted snooping” or exposed personal information.
The lawsuit was originally filed by a group of labor unions and retirees
represented by the group Democracy Forward. It’s one of more than two
dozen lawsuits filed over DOGE’s work, which has included deep cuts at
federal agencies and large-scale layoffs.
The plaintiffs called the high court's order “a sad day for our
democracy and a scary day for millions of people. Elon Musk may have
left Washington, D.C., but his impact continues to harm millions of
people."
Liz Huston, a spokesperson for the White House, applauded the order.
“The Supreme Court allowing the Trump Administration to carry out
commonsense efforts to eliminate waste, fraud, and abuse and modernize
government information systems is a huge victory for the rule of law."
The nation’s court system has been ground zero for pushback to President
Donald Trump’s sweeping conservative agenda, with hundreds of lawsuits
filed challenging policies on everything from immigration to education
to mass layoffs of federal workers.
In the other DOGE order handed down Friday, the justices extended a
pause on orders that would require the team to publicly disclose
information about its operations, as part of a lawsuit filed by a
government watchdog group.
Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington argues that DOGE,
which has been central to Trump’s push to remake the government, is a
federal agency and must be subject to the Freedom of Information Act.
But the Trump administration says DOGE is just a presidential advisory
body aimed at government cost-cutting, which would make it exempt from
requests for documents under FOIA.
The justices did not decide that issue Friday, but the conservative
majority held that U.S. District Judge Christopher Cooper ruled too
broadly in ordering documents be turned over to CREW.
___
Associated Press writers Mark Sherman and Chris Megerian contributed to
this report.
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