US Supreme Court allows DOGE access to social security data

The decision by a divided court will lift one legal barrier to the work done by Donald Trump’s cost-cutting group.

The Supreme Court, in Washington. Picture: Andrew Harnik/Getty Images

The US Supreme Court has cleared the way for members of the Department of Government Efficiency, a cost-cutting group once led by Elon Musk, to access sensitive Social Security Administration records.

Granting an emergency request by the Trump administration, the justices on Friday lifted a lower court order that for now had barred DOGE employees or affiliates from accessing the agency’s systems and directed them to delete personal information they already had gathered.

“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 a brief unsigned order.

The court’s three liberal justices objected. Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson said the majority shouldn’t have rushed to the administration’s aid before the courts have time to determine whether DOGE’s access is lawful.

“Once again, this Court dons its emergency-responder gear, rushes to the scene, and uses its equitable power to fan the flames rather than extinguish them,” she wrote in dissent.

The Social Security Administration has been a significant target for Elon Musk, the billionaire Tesla CEO who launched DOGE.

In a second action on Friday, the Supreme Court set aside a lower court order that allowed a watchdog group to obtain records about DOGE’s status within the government. The justices sent the matter back for more legal proceedings. The court’s three liberals again objected.

The Trump administration has said the data will help DOGE, created by a Jan. 20 executive order, streamline government and ferret out fraud.

The injunction was issued by U.S. District Judge Ellen Hollander in Maryland, who said that DOGE failed to justify its need for sweeping access to the personal information of tens of millions of Americans, including Social Security numbers, dates of birth, home addresses, income and assets, citizenship status, medical information and disability status.

Hollander did allow DOGE team members access to some redacted or anonymised information, so long as they completed training and background checks comparable to those typically required for SSA employees.

The ruling came in a lawsuit brought by a group of labour unions, who allege data-sharing with DOGE violates the Privacy Act of 1974, which strictly regulates what information about American citizens can be stored by federal agencies, and who can access the data.

The Social Security Administration has been a significant target for Musk, the billionaire Tesla CEO who launched DOGE. He has called Social Security “the biggest Ponzi scheme of all time.” Musk has since stepped back from his involvement with DOGE.

Attorneys representing DOGE had argued that anonymising the data would be too difficult and disrupt its efforts to root out fraud.

DOGE’s swift and sweeping work to slash the government’s size and spending has drawn numerous legal challenges by critics and opponents who claim that it is cutting corners and failing to adhere to legal procedures.

Musk also has faced criticism personally and has left the Trump administration to refocus on his businesses after a tumultuous few months.

DOGE has had some success gathering data from federal agencies. In one recent decision, an appeals panel lifted an order that barred the Education Department, the Office of Personnel Management and the Treasury Department from disclosing to DOGE the personal identifying information of roughly two million Americans.

Dow Jones Newswires